Yael R.

Dragwyla First North American rights

Email: Polaris93@aol.com 144,800 words
http://polaris93.livejournal.com/

Qaballah and Tarot: A Basic Course in Nine

Lessons
Lesson III: The 22 Paths of the Tree of Life and the
Greater Arcana of the Tarot

B. The Individual Paths

18. Key 28
Tzaddi x, “Fish-Hook.” Trump XVII, The Star.35 Aquarius ü. Cardinal value, 90; ordinal value,
18. At the end of a word, has the form { and the value 900. Connects Sephirah 7, Netzach, with
Sephirah 9, Yesod. Roman/English equivalents: Ts; Tz.

a. Qaballistic Meanings and Theory

Aquarius is the 11th month of the astrological year, and is the ruler of the 11 th House of the horoscope.
The Tarot card associated with Tzaddi, Trump XVII, The Star, shows a nude woman kneeling by a
body of water, pouring water from two jugs, holding one in each hand. Above her there are seven eight-
pointed stars surrounding a larger star. The title of the card is “The Daughter of the Firmament. The
Dweller Between the Waters.”
This Path is distinctly feminine, joining Sephirah 7, Netzach, associated with Venus, to Sephirah 9,
Yesod, associated with Luna, both feminine influences. These are reinforced by Juno, the Roman Goddess
who watches over the female sex, and was regarded as the Genius of womanhood, in its main attribution.
Another correspondence with this Trump is Pallas Athena as the patroness of both the practical and fine
arts (the arts are one of the signature characteristics of natives of Aquarius), as is Ganymede, because of
his great beauty and because of his role as Cup-bearer to the Gods. (Ahepi and Aroueris are the Egyptian
equivalents of these Greek and Roman divinities..)
The plant associated with this Path is the olive, which Athena created for mankind’s benefit. One of
its iconic animals is Zeus’s eagle, 37 which is said to have carried Ganymede away to Olympus; and in fact
the natal chart of the United States of America, whose icon is the bald eagle ( Haliaeetus leucocephalus),
has Aquarius on the Midheaven and Uranus, ruler of Aquarius, rising in the First House and closely
conjunct the Ascendant as well as the warrior star Aldebaran.
 The perfume of Aquarius is galbanum, and its color is sky-blue. Its Yetziratic title is “The Natural
Intelligence.” The jewel associated with it is chalcedony, suggesting soft, watery clouds and the stars of
the heavens above, with which Aquarius is associated. 38
Aquarius rules the heavens and everything that goes with them, such as climate and weather.
Whereas Pisces and the 12th House of the horoscope rule the past, not only the immediate personal past but
the long-term past, as well, both historical, applying to humanity in general, and one’s own past lifetimes,
Aquarius and the 11th House of the horoscope rule the future. Hence whereas Pisces and the 12 th House
are associated with New Age interests, humanity’s evolutionary past and the individual’s past lifetimes,
Aquarius and the 11th House are associated with science fiction, advanced (“blue-sky”) technology and
science, technological and scientific breakthroughs, travel in space and the space industry (though Scorpio
and its ruler Pluto rule outer space itself), and everything radically new and different. Whereas Pisces and
the 12th House close down and close out, ruling places of seclusion such as prisons and hospitals and all
things that people prefer to keep hidden, such as skeletons in the closet, Aquarius and the 11 th House open
up and out, reaching for the sky. Whereas Pisces and the 12 th House rule Hell, torture, and all forms of
punishment, Aquarius and the 11 th House rule Heaven, the Grace of God, and the sort of luck that is made
for one by the Gods, as opposed to the luck one makes for oneself, which is ruled by Leo and the 5 th
House.
Our two nearest neighbors in space, at least as far as bodies that might be colonizable by us go, are
the Moon and Venus. Luna is represented by Sephirah 9, Yesod, and Venus is represented by Sephirah 7,
Netzach. The Path connecting Yesod with Netzach is Tzaddi, associated with Aquarius and the 11 th House
and thus with everything connected with our getting into space and establishing a permanent presence
there.
Aquarius rules the heavens above and everything in them. So an examination of the celestial objects
that grace the sign and the constellation of that name – which aren’t actually the same – for the brighter
stars they contain may illuminate their meaning.
The constellation* Aquarius, a region on the sky, covers 980 square degrees. It is visible between
latitudes 65° north and 90° south, that is, all the way from well north of most of Alaska and Maine to the
South Pole. Its right ascension is 23 hours. As of 2002, the Sun appears in the constellation Aquarius
from February 16 to March 11. In sidereal astrology, the Sun transits the constellation from February 15
to March 14 (late Aquarius [the sign] to late Pisces [the sign]).
The following stars and other objects are found in the constellation of Aquarius:

Stars Characteristics Additional Notes

Alpha Aquarii A giant star with a The first three stars
(Sadalmelik) diameter perhaps 100 described here share
times that of the Sun. It similar names. Their
is located 760 light years Arabic names
from Earth and shines at translate into “The
magnitude 2.95. luck of the king,”
“The luck of lucks,”
and “The lucky star
of hidden things.”
Beta Aquarii The brightest star of the
(Sadalsuud) constellation, shining at
magnitude 2.9. Its
computed distance is
about 600 light years
from Earth.
Gamma Aquarii A spectroscopic binary
(Sadachbia) with a period of 58.1
days. It is located 158
light years from Earth
and shines at magnitude
3.8. These figures lead
to an actual luminosity
of about 25 suns.
Zeta Aquarii Zeta is the central star of
 the of the Y-shaped
asterism that makes up
the water jar of
Aquarius. It is a close
pair of 4th-magnitude
stars 1.7 arcseconds
apart.
R Aquarii An interesting variable
star that reaches the 6th
magnitude at maximum
and has a period of little
over a year. R Aquarii is
a symbiotic star system,
an interacting pair
consisting of a variable
red giant and a white
dwarf companion.

Notable Deep Characteristics Additional Notes

Sky
Obje
cts
M2 A bright globular cluster
visible with the naked
eye on a dark sky.
Through binoculars or a
small telescope it
appears as a small hazy
patch with a diameter of
7 arcminutes.
M72 A faint globular cluster
located in the western
part of the constellation.
It is unimpressive in
small telescopes,
appearing as a pale
nebulous patch of light.
M73 This object is a small
asterism composed of
four stars with
magnitudes between
10.5 and 12. Seen with a
small telescope M73
looks like a tiny
nebulosity, and this is
probably why Messier
included this object in
his catalog.
NGC 7009: The Nebula. B. Balick et al. Coincidentally, the
Saturn NASA NGC 7009 (The traditional ruler of
Saturn Nebula) - One of Aquarius is the
the brightest planetary planet Saturn.
nebulae in the sky, first
observed by Sir William
 Herschel in 1782. It was
named the Saturn
Nebula because when
observed with larger
telescopes its shape
resembles that of the
planet Saturn. The
Saturn Nebula was the
first discoveries of
William Herschel on
September 7, 1782,
when he started his
great survey. This
remarkable planetary
nebula has its name
from its appearance,
which resembles a faint
suggestion of the planet
Saturn with rings nearly
edge-on (Lord Rosse
named it in the 1840s).
According to Admiral
Smyth, the Saturn
Nebula was one of
Struve’s nine “Rare
Celestial Objects.”
While the Saturn nebula
measures 36” in
diameter, it has an
extended halo of about
100”, according to the
Sky Catalogue 2000.0.
Its central star is rather
bright with mag 11.5.
The distance of the
Saturn Nebula is not
known very accurately.
Hynes gives 2,400 light-
years (adopted here), the
Sky Catalogue 2000.0
about 2,900, and
Burnham adopts
O’Dell’s (1963) estimate
of 3,900 ly. To find
NGC 7009, center the
5th-magnitude star Nu
Aquarii in your finder
scope and then move
one degree to the west.
At low powers the
nebula is almost star-
like, but going to higher
powers reveals a bright
greenish disk with no
other evident details.
NGC 7293 (The The closest of all
Helix Nebula) planetary nebulae, lying
at a distance of 400 light
 years from Earth. To
find the nebula, start
from Fomalhaut (Alpha
Piscis Austrinus) and
move your telescope 11
degrees northwest to
5th-magnitude 47
Aquarii. From this star
slide two degrees east to
Upsilon Aquarii, and
you’re almost there. The
Helix is just one degree
west of this star. Small
scopes show NGC 7293
as a circular patch of
faint light, but a 6-inch
scope reveals that the
center is dark and
contains a 13th-
magnitude star. The
nebula’s diameter is 16
arcminutes, so when
observing use a wide
field eyepiece and low
magnification.

Planetary Characteristics Additional Notes

Syste
ms
Gliese 876 A red dwarf star
approximately 15 light-
years away from Earth
in the constellation of
Aquarius (the Water-
bearer). As of 2010, it
has been confirmed that
four extrasolar planets
orbit the star. Two of the
middle planets are
similar to Jupiter, while
the closest planet is
thought to be similar to
a small Neptune or a
large terrestrial planet,
and the outer planet has
similar mass to Uranus.
This is the first
planetary system found
around a red dwarf star.
The system has at least
four planets, including
one terrestrial planet 6.6
times the mass of Earth.
91 Aquarii b An extrasolar planet
(also known as orbiting in the 91
HD 219449 b) Aquarii system,
 approximately 148 light-
years away in the
constellation of
Aquarius. It orbits the
orange giant star 91
Aquarii at the average
distance of 48.5 Gm,
which is closer than
Mercury is to the Sun
(57.9 Gm). The planet
takes half a year to
revolve around the star
in a very circular orbit
(e=0.003). Its mass is
2.9 times Jupiter and the
semimajor axis of its
orbit is 0.3 AU.
Gliese 849 b The first long-period
Jupiter-like planet found
around the red dwarf
star. Its mass is 0.82
times Jupiter and the
semimajor axis of its
orbit is 2.35 AU.

Deep Sky Characteristics Additional Notes

Obje
cts
Globular cluster
Messier 2
Globular cluster
Messier 72
Open cluster
Messier 73
The Saturn To the southwest of η
Nebula (NGC Aquarii
7009, a planetary
nebula)
The Helix Located southwest of δ
Nebula (NGC Aquarii.
7293)

Meteor Characteristics Additional Notes

Sho
wers
The Eta Active between April 21 Maximum activity
Aquarids shower and May 12, from a occurs on May 5th,
radiant located in the when the shower
north central portion of produces about 20
the constellation. meteors per hour for
observers in the
northern hemisphere
 and 50 for observers
in the southern
hemisphere.
The Delta This shower is divided
Aquarids shower into two sub-showers
separated by 15 degrees
of declination.
The southern Delta Active between July
Aquarids shower 14 and August 18,
with a maximum of
20 meteors per hour
on July 29th.
The northern Delta The duration of the
Aquarids shower northern Delta
Aquarids shower
covers the period of
July 16 to September
10. The maximum
occurs on August
13th when ten
meteors per hour can
be seen on a dark
sky, away from city
lights.
The Iota
Aquarids also
show two distinct
showers.
The southern Iota
Aquarids occur during
July 1 to September 18,
and the August 6th
maximum produces
about eight meteors per
hour.
The northern Iota
Aquarids have a
duration from August 11
to September 10, with
maximum activity on
August 25th when the
shower produces five too
ten meteors per hour.

In illustrations, the brightest stars of Aquarius are represented as the figure of a man, while the
fainter naked eye stars are represented as a vessel from which is pouring a stream of water. The water
flows southwards into the mouth of the southern fish, Piscis Austrinus.
As to the sign Aquarius, which corresponds to one month of the tropical astrological and
astronomical year, the Sun transits the sign from January 20 to February 19. Its right ascension, which
can be converted into celestial longitude, begins at 20h00m00s and ends at 22h00m00s (its latitude goes
from pole to pole, and everything bracketed by its beginning and end, and going from pole to pole, is
included in the sign). Notable objects in that band of sky include:
 Stars Characteristics Additional Notes
(Data given as of January 1, 2000)
Albireo (β Right Ascension 19h 30m 45.3954s; A 3rd-magnitude star in the constellation
Cygni) declination +27° 57′ 54.995″; apparent of The Swan. Albireo (β Cyg / β Cygni /
magnitude 5.09; Spectral type B8Ve. Beta Cyg / Beta Cygni) is the fifth
brightest star in the constellation Cygnus.
Although it has the Bayer designation
beta, it is fainter than Gamma Cygni,
Delta Cygni, and Epsilon Cygni. Albireo
appears to the naked eye to be a single
star but can be resolved with a telescope
into a double star, consisting of a brighter
yellow star (actually a binary system of
two stars in orbit) and a fainter blue star.
Albireo is cherished by amateur
astronomers as a beautiful small
telescope object. Albireo is
approximately 380 light-years (120 pc)
away from the Earth. When viewed with
the naked eye, Albireo appears to be a
single star. However, when viewed with a
telescope it readily resolves into a double
star, consisting of Albireo A (amber,
apparent magnitude 3.1), and Albireo B
(blue-green, apparent magnitude 5.1.)
Separated by 35 seconds of arc, the two
components provide one of the best
contrasting double stars in the sky due to
their different colors. It is not known
whether the two components are orbiting
around each other in a physical binary
system. If they are, their orbital period is
probably at least 100,000 years. In 1976,
component A was itself discovered to be
a binary star, using speckle
interferometry and the 2.1-meter
telescope at the Kitt Peak National
Observatory. An orbit for the pair has
since been computed using
interferometric measurements, but as
only approximately a quarter of the orbit
has been observed, the orbital parameters
must be regarded as preliminary. The
current angular separation between the
components of around 0.4 arcseconds is
tantalizingly close to the limit which
visual observations through instruments
of at least 20” in size can resolve, under
very rare perfect seeing conditions.
Albireo B is a fast-rotating Be star, with
an equatorial rotational velocity of at
least 250 kilometers per second.[6] Its
surface temperature has been
spectroscopically estimated to be about
13,200 K.
Altair (α Constellation Aquila The name Altair has been used since
Aquilae) Right ascension 19h 50m 46.9990s medieval times. It is an abbreviation of
Declination +08° 52′ 05.959″ the Arabic phrase, an-nasr al-tā’ir
Apparent magnitude (V) 0.77
Spectral type A7V
Altair (Alpha Aquilae / Alpha Aql / α
Aquilae / α Aql / Atair) is the brightest
star in the constellation Aquila and the
twelfth brightest star in the night sky. It
is an A-type main sequence star with an
apparent visual magnitude of 0.77 and is
one of the vertices of the Summer
Triangle; the other two are Deneb and
Vega. Altair rotates rapidly, with a
velocity at the equator of approximately
286 km/s. A study with the Palomar
Testbed Interferometer revealed that
Altair is not spherical, but is flattened at
the poles due to its high rate of rotation.
Other interferometric studies with
multiple telescopes, operating in the
infrared, have imaged and confirmed this
phenomenon. Altair is located 16.8
light-years (5.14 parsecs) from Earth and
is one of the closest stars visible to the
naked eye. Along with Beta Aquilae and
Gamma Aquilae, it forms the well-
known line of stars sometimes referred to
as the Family of Aquila or Shaft of
Aquila. Altair is a type-A main sequence
star with approximately 1.8 times the
mass of the Sun and 11 times its
luminosity. Altair possesses an extremely
rapid rte of rotation; it has a rotational
period of approximately 9 hours. For
comparison, the equator of the Sun
requires just over 25 days for a complete
rotation. This rapid rotation forces Altair
to be oblate; its equatorial diameter is
over 20 percent greater than its polar
diameter. Satellite measurements made
in 1999 with the Wide-Field Infrared
Explorer showed that the brightness of
Altair fluctuates slightly, varying by less
than a thousandth of a magnitude. As a
result, it was identified in 2005 as a δ
Scuti variable star. Its light curve can be
approximated by adding together a
number of sine waves, with periods that
range between 0.8 and 1.5 hours. False-
color image of the rapidly rotating star
Altair, made with the MIRC imager on
the CHARA array on Mt. Wilson. The
angular diameter of Altair was measured
interferometrically by R. Hanbury Brown
and his coworkers at Narrabri
Observatory in the 1960s. They found a
diameter of 3 milliarcseconds. Although
Hanbury Brown et al. realized that Altair
would be rotationally flattened, they had
(English: The flying eagle). This name
was applied by the Arabs to the asterism
of α, β, and γ Aquilae and probably goes
back to the ancient Babylonians and
Sumerians, who called α Aquilae the
eagle star. The spelling Atair has also
been used. The Koori people of Victoria
also knew Altair as Bunjil, the Wedge-
tailed Eagle, and β and γ Aquilae are his
two wives the Black Swans. The people
of the Murray River knew the star as
Totyerguil. The Murray River was
formed when Totyerguil the hunter
speared Otjout, a giant Murray Cod, who,
when wounded, churned a channel across
southern Australia before entering the
sky as the constellation Delphinus.
In Chinese, the asterism consisting of α,
β, and γ Aquilae is known as Hé Gŭ
(English: River Drum). Altair is thus
known as Hé Gŭ èr (English: the Second
Star of the Drum at the River, or more
literally, Riverdrum II). However, it is
better known by its other names: Qiān
Niú Xīng or Niú Láng Xīng (in English,
Star of the Cowherd). These names are
from the love story of Qī Xī, in which
Niú Láng and his two children, β and γ
Aquilae, are separated from their mother,
Zhī Nŭ (English: Weaver Girl), the star
Vega, by the Milky Way. They are only
permitted to meet once a year, when the
Milky Way is crossed by a bridge of
magpies. The Japanese Tanabata festival,
in which Altair is known as Hikoboshi
(English: Cow Herder Star?), is based on
this legend. In astrology, the star Altair
is ill-omened, portending danger from
reptiles.
 insufficient data to experimentally
observe its oblateness. Altair was later
observed to be flattened by infrared
interferometric measurements made by
the Palomar Testbed Interferometer in
1999 and 2000. This work was published
by G. T. van Belle and his co-authors in
2001. Theory predicts that, owing to
Altair’s rapid rotation, its surface gravity
and effective temperature should be
lower at the equator, making the equator
less luminous than the poles. This
phenomenon, known as gravity
darkening or the von Zeipel effect, was
confirmed for Altair by measurements
made by the Navy Prototype Optical
Interferometer in 2001, and analyzed by
Ohishi et al. (2004) and Peterson et al.
(2006). Also, A. Domiciano de Souza et
al. (2005) verified gravity darkening
using the measurements made by the
Palomar and Navy interferometers,
together with new measurements made
by the VINCI instrument at the VLTI.
Altair is one of the few stars for which a
direct image has been obtained. In 2006
and 2007, J. D. Monnier and his
coworkers produced an image of Altair’s
surface from 2006 infrared observations
made with the MIRC instrument on the
CHARA array interferometer; this was
the first time the surface of any main-
sequence star, apart from the Sun, had
been imaged. The false-color image was
published in 2007 and can be seen above
and to the left; the brighter regions are
shown in white and darker regions in
blue. In this image, North (the direction
towards the North Celestial Pole) is up
and East is left, and the white line is the
rotational axis of Altair. The black grid
shows lines of latitude and longitude in
an Altair-centric coordinate system. The
von Zeipel effect can be observed in the
image, which shows a white spot near the
pole and a darker equator. The equatorial
radius of the star was estimated to be
2.03 solar radii, and the polar radius 1.63
solar radii – a 25% increase of the stellar
radius from pole to equator.
Giedi (α Right ascension 20h17m38.9s
Capricorni) Declination −12°30′30″
Apparent magnitude (V) +4.30/+8.5
Distance 690 ± 140 ly
(211 ± 43 pc)
Spectral type G3Ib

Alpha¹ Capricorni (α¹ Cap / α¹

 Capricorni) is a binary star in the
constellation Capricornus. It also has the
traditional star name Prima Giedi or
Algiedi Prima, and shares the name
Algedi with α² Capricorni. It is
approximately 690 light years from
Earth. The primary component, α¹
Capricorni A, is a yellow G-type
supergiant with an apparent magnitude
of +4.30. Its companion, α¹ Capricorni B,
is an eighth magnitude star, separated by
0.65 arcseconds from the primary.
Dabih (β Right ascension 20h21m00.7s
Capricorni) Declination −14°46′53″
Apparent magnitude (V) +3.05/+6.09
Spectral type K0II+B8V/A0III

Beta Capricorni (β Cap / β Capricorni) is

a star system in the constellation
Capricornus. It has the traditional name
Dabih, which comes from the Arabic Al
Dabih, meaning “the butcher.” The β
Capricorni system is located 328 light
years from Earth. Because it is near the
ecliptic, β Capricorni can be occulted by
the Moon, and also (rarely) by planets.
With binoculars or a small telescope, β
Capricorni can be resolved into a double
star. The brighter of these two
components, β¹ Capricorni or Dabih
Major, has an apparent magnitude of
+3.05, while the dimmer one, β²
Capricorni or Dabih Minor, has an
apparent magnitude of +6.09. The two
components are separated by 3.5
arcminutes on the sky, putting them at
least 21,000 AU (0.34 light years) apart.
They take approximately 700,000 years
to complete one orbit. Both of these
components are themselves made up of
multiple stars. The brighter component,
β¹ Capricorni, is the more complex of the
pair. It has at least three components,
and it’s spectrum is difficult to interpret.
It is dominated by a pair of stars, the
orange K-type bright giant β Capricorni
Aa, with an apparent magnitude of
+3.08, and the blue-white B-Type main
sequence dwarf, β Capricorni Ab with an
apparent magnitude of +7.20. These two
components are separated by 0.05
arcseconds (5 AU) and have an orbital
period of 3.77 years. The Aa component
has a surface temperature of 4900
Kelvin, a diameter of 35 times that of the
Sun, and a luminosity 600 times that of
the Sun. The Ab component has another,
unseen companion, β Capricorni Ac,
 which orbits Ab with an orbital period of
8.7 days. It is thought that the Aa
component is itself multiple. The
dimmer of the visual double star, β¹
Capricorni, is simpler and more studied.
It is a binary star, whose brighter
component, β Capricorni B, has a
magnitude of 6.1. It is a A0-giant with
40 times the luminosity of the Sun. The
companion, β Capricorni C, is
approximately 3 arcseconds from B. β
Capricorni B is unusual for having large
amounts of mercury and manganese in
its atmosphere. Two other nearby stars
were discovered by John Herschel. These
lie 112 arcseconds away from β¹
Capricorni, and it is unclear whether
they are simply optical doubles or part of
the β Capricorni system. They are
sometimes referred to as β Capricorni D
and E.
Oculus (π Right ascension 20h27m19.2s
Capricorni) Declination −18°12′42″
Apparent magnitude (V) +5.08
Magnitude: 5.2
Distance 670 ± 110 ly
(204 ± 33 pc)
Spectral type B8II-III
Pi Capricorni (π Cap / π Capricorni) is a
double star in the constellation
Capricornus. It also has the traditional
star name Okul. It is approximately 670
light years from Earth. The primary
component, π Capricorni A, is a blue-
white B-type bright giant with an
apparent magnitude of +5.08. It is a
spectroscopic binary whose two
components are separated by 0.1
arcseconds. The third component, π
Capricorni B is an eighth magnitude star
3.4 arcseconds from the primary.
Legend: During their war with the giants,
the Gods were driven into Egypt and
pursued by Typhon. In order to escape,
each was forced to change his shape, and
Pan, leaping into the Nile, turned the
upper part of his body into a goat and the
lower part into a fish, a shape considered
by Jupiter worthy of commemoration in
the heavens. (Vivian E. Robson, The
Fixed Stars and Constellations in
Astrology (Samuel Weiser, Inc., 1923,
1979), p.35.) Influence: Ptolemy’s
observations are as follows “The stars in
the horns of Capricorn have efficacy
similar to that of Venus, and partly to
that of Mars. The stars in the mouth are
like Saturn, and partly like Venus: those
in the feet and in the belly act in the same
manner as Mars and Mercury: those in
the tail are like Saturn and Jupiter.” By
the Cabalists this constellation is
associated with the Hebrew letter Yod
and the 10th Tarot Trump “The Wheel of
Fortune.”, ibid., p.36.) The constellation
Capricorn has a great influence over
human affairs portending major changes
in such areas as climate and political
customs. Along with the sign, the
constellation is also noted as the
“Mansion of Kings.” Unfavorably
situated with regards to lunar eclipses, it
indicates major storms, especially at sea.
[Cf. George Noonan, Fixed Stars and
Judicial Astrology (1990), p.36.]
The astrological influences of the
constellation Capricorn, as given by
 Manilius:

“In her shrine Vesta tends your fires,

Capricorn: and from her you derive your
skills and callings. For whatever needs
fire to function and demands a renewal of
flame for its work must be counted as of
your domain. To pry for hidden metals,
to smelt out riches deposited in the veins
of the earth, to fold sure-handed the
malleable mass – these skills will come
from you, as will aught which is
fashioned of silver or gold. That hot
furnaces melt iron and bronze, and ovens
give to the wheat its final form, will come
as gifts from you. You also give a
fondness for clothes and wares which
dispel the cold, since your lot falls for all
time in winter’s season, wherein you
shorten the nights you have brought to
their greatest length and give birth to a
new year by enlarging the daylight hours.
Hence comes a restless quality in their
lives and a mind which is often changed
and floats this way and that; the first half
of the sign is the slave of Venus, and that
with guilt involved, but a more virtuous
old age is promised by the conjoined fish
below.” [Astronomica, Manilius, 1st
century AD, book 4, p.241.]

The astrological influences of the star

Oculus: With Mercury: Of the nature of
Saturn and Venus. It gives a clever and
piercing intellect when in conjunction
with Mercury. (Robson, op. cit., p. 180.).
Bos (ρ
Capricorni)
Armus (η
Capricorni)
Dorsum (θ
Capricorni)
Castra (ε
Capricorni)
Nashira (γ
Capricorni)
Sadalsuud (β
Aquarii)
Deneb Algedi (δ
Capricorni)

This astronomical information is given here to show the richness of this particular region of sky, but
also to give the student an idea of the tremendous number of scientifically verifiable correspondences that
are available for Tzaddi and Trump XVII, The Star. These can in turn also be tied to various
mythological, anthropological, and literary correspondences associated with these heavenly objects, and it
is well worth the student’s time, trouble, and effort to track them down. Furthermore, one aspect of
Aquarius includes the sciences, especially astronomy, ecology, sociology, and sociobiology. Therefore the
more data the student has concerning the objective sciences in general and these four in particular, the
more useful correspondences for this Path and its associated Trump he will have.
There are numerous other celestial objects contained in these two adjacent regions of the sky ,
Aquarius the sign and Aquarius the constellation. For a listing complete as of known celestial objects as
of 1978, see Volumes 1-3 of Robert Burnham, Jr.’s Burnham’s Celestial Handbook: An Observer’s
Guide to the Universe Beyond the Solar System ( Dover, 1978), passim. For objects discovered since
then, the interested student should consult online resources such as NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day
(http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/), Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/),
http://www.skyandtelescope.com/, http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx, and the many academic
journals of professional astronomers, cosmologists, astrophysicists, and those in related fields, as well as
the hard-copy versions of these.
Mythologically speaking, Aquarius is identified as GU.LA, “The Great One,” in the Babylonian star
catalogues, and represents the Sumerian God Ea, Who later was known to the Babylonians as Enki. In
the early Bronze Age, the longitude of the Winter Solstice was located in this constellation. In Old
Babylonian astronomy, Ea was the ruler of the southernmost quarter of the Sun’s path, the “Way of Ea”,
corresponding to the period of 45 days on either side of winter solstice. In the Greek tradition, the
constellation became represented as simply a single vase from which a stream poured down to Piscis
Austrinus. The name in the Hindu zodiac is likewise kumbha, “water-pitcher,” showing that the zodiac
reached India via Greek intermediaries.
Aquarius is sometimes identified with Ganymede, a beautiful youth in Greek mythology with whom
Zeus fell in love and, in the disguise of an eagle (represented by the constellation Aquila) carried off to
Olympus to be cup-bearer to the gods.
Aquarius has also been identified as the pourer of the waters that flooded the Earth in the ancient
Greek version of the Great Flood myth. As such, the constellation Eridanus the river is sometimes
identified as a river being poured by Aquarius.
Together with the constellation Pegasus, Aquarius may be part of the origin of the myth of the Mares
of Diomedes, which forms one of The Twelve Labors of Herakles. Its association with pouring out rivers,
and the nearby constellation of Capricornus, may be the source of the myth of the Augean stable, which
forms another of the labors.

Qaballistic correspondences:

Yetziratic text: “The Twenty-eighth Path is called the Natural Intelligence. By it is completed
and perfected the nature of all that exists beneath the Sun.”

Yetziratic title: The Daughter of the Firmament. The Dweller between the Waters.

Hebrew letter: ‫צ ץ‬, (Tzaddi, “Fish-Hook”)

Numerical value: 90, 900

Astrological assignment: Aquarius, which is ruled by Saturn and Uranus; in which Jupiter and
Neptune are exalted; and of which Venus is the esoteric ruler. Aquarius is a Fixed, Airy
sign. Aquarius is hot, moist, Airy, diurnal, masculine, sanguine, human, and positive. The
astrological month of Aquarius is the 11 th of the astrological year, coming right in the middle
of astronomical and astrological Winter, and is strongly associated with the storms and other
heavy weather characteristic of that time of year in the Northern Hemisphere and the
illnesses that often result from exposure to it. Along with its rulers, Saturn and Uranus, it
rules the 11th House of the horoscope.

Alchemical correspondences: Fixed and Airy materials.

Ecological process, realm, or principle:

Aquarius is associated with the atmosphere of the Earth, and in particular with the
stratosphere, the upper part of the atmosphere, at the top of which there is almost no oxygen
or other gases, and outer space begins (in fact, one common poetic term for the upper
stratosphere is “the edge of space”; this begins around 30,000-40,000 above the surface of
 the Earth, and can be easily observed for what it is by passengers on a cross-country or
oceanic flight by jet airliner, which travels in those rarefied upper regions of the atmosphere
to reduce atmospheric drag and thereby conserve as much fuel as possible during its flight).
Aquarius is also associated with the Jet Stream. Jet streams are fast flowing, narrow air
currents found in the atmospheres of some planets. The main jet streams are located near the
tropopause, the transition between the troposphere (the lowest portion of Earth’s atmosphere,
where temperature decreases with height)* and the stratosphere (where temperature
increases with height).** The major jet streams on Earth are westerly winds (flowing west to
east). Their paths typically have a meandering shape; jet streams may start, stop, split into
two or more parts, combine into one stream, or flow in various directions including the
opposite direction of most of the jet. The strongest jet streams are the polar jets, at around 7
– 12 km (23,000 – 39,000 ft) above sea level, and the higher and somewhat weaker
subtropical jets at around 10 – 16 km (33,000 – 52,000 ft). The northern hemisphere and the
southern hemisphere each have both a polar jet and a subtropical jet. The northern
hemisphere polar jet flows over the middle to northern latitudes of North America, Europe,
and Asia and their intervening oceans, while the southern hemisphere polar jet mostly
circles Antarctica all year round.

*The troposphere is the lowest portion of Earth’s atmosphere. It contains approximately 75% of the
atmosphere’s mass and 99% of its water vapor and aerosols. The average depth of the troposphere is
approximately 17 km (11 mi) in the middle latitudes. It is deeper in the tropical regions, up to 20 km
(12 mi), and shallower near the poles, at 7 km (4.3 mi) in summer, and indistinct in winter. The
lowest part of the troposphere, where friction with the Earth’s surface influences air flow, is the
planetary boundary layer. This layer is typically a few hundred meters to 2 km (1.2 mi) deep
depending on the landform and time of day. The border between the troposphere and stratosphere,
called the tropopause, is a temperature inversion.

**The stratosphere (from the Latin stratus, meaning “a spreading out”) is the second major layer of
Earth’s atmosphere, just above the troposphere, and below the mesosphere. It is stratified in
temperature, with warmer layers higher up and cooler layers farther down. This is in contrast to the
troposphere near the Earth’s surface, which is cooler higher up and warmer farther down. The border
of the troposphere and stratosphere, the tropopause, is marked by where this inversion begins, which
in terms of atmospheric thermodynamics is the equilibrium level. The stratosphere is situated between
about 10 km (6 miles) and 50 km (31 miles) altitude above the surface at moderate latitudes, while at
the poles it starts at about 8 km (5 miles) altitude.
The mesosphere (from the Greek words mesos = middle and sphaira = ball) is the layer of the
Earth’s atmosphere that is directly above the stratosphere and directly below the thermosphere. The
mesosphere is located about 50 to 85 kilometers (30 to 50 miles) above the Earth’s surface.
The stratosphere and mesosphere are referred to as the middle atmosphere. The mesopause, at an
altitude of 80 – 90 km (50 – 56 mi), separates the mesosphere from the thermosphere – the second-
outermost layer of the Earth’s atmosphere. This is also around the same altitude as the turbopause,
below which different chemical species are well mixed due to turbulent eddies. Above this level the
atmosphere becomes non-uniform; the scale heights of different chemical species differ by their
molecular masses.
The thermosphere is the biggest of all the layers of the earth’s atmosphere directly above the
mesosphere and directly below the exosphere. Within this layer, ultraviolet radiation causes
ionization. The International Space Station has a stable orbit within the middle of the thermosphere,
between 320 and 380 kilometers (200 and 240 mi). Auroras also occur in the thermosphere.
Named from the Greek θερμός (thermos), “heat,” the thermosphere begins about 80 kilometers
(50 mi) above the earth. At these high altitudes, the residual atmospheric gases sort into strata
according to molecular mass (see turbosphere). Thermospheric temperatures increase with altitude
due to absorption of highly energetic solar radiation by the small amount of residual oxygen still
present. Temperatures are highly dependent on solar activity, and can rise to 1,500° C (2,730° F).
Radiation causes the atmosphere particles in this layer to become electrically charged (see
ionosphere), enabling radio waves to bounce off and be received beyond the horizon. At the
exosphere, beginning at 500 to 1,000 kilometers (310 to 620 mi) above the Earth’s surface, the
atmosphere turns into space.
 The highly diluted gas in this layer can reach 2,500° C (4,530° F) during the day. Even though
the temperature is so high, one would not feel warm in the thermosphere, because it is so near
vacuum that there is not enough contact with the few atoms of gas to transfer much heat. A normal
thermometer would read significantly below 0 °C (32 °F), due to the energy lost by thermal radiation
overtaking the energy acquired from the atmospheric gas by direct contact.
The dynamics of the lower thermosphere (below approximately 120 kilometers (75 mi)) are
dominated by atmospheric tide, which is driven, in part, by the very significant diurnal heating. The
atmospheric tide dissipates above this level since molecular concentrations do not support the
coherent motion needed for fluid flow.
The exosphere is the uppermost layer of the atmosphere. In the exosphere, an upward traveling
molecule can escape to space if it is moving fast enough to attain escape velocity; otherwise it will be
pulled back to the celestial body by gravity. In either case, such a molecule is unlikely to collide with
another molecule due to the exosphere’s low density.
The main gases within the Earth’s exosphere are the lightest gases, mainly hydrogen, with some
helium, carbon dioxide, and atomic oxygen near the exobase. The exosphere is the last layer before
space. Since there is no clear boundary with space and the exosphere, the exosphere is sometimes
used synonymously with outer space.

Aquarius is also associated with the Van Allen Belts.*

Aquarius is associated with the sky and everything in it, and thus with all
meteorological phenomena, including weather, climate, meteors, etc.
Aquarius is associated with all astronomical phenomena.
Aquarius rules the winds and all phenomena connected with them, especially those
powered by enormous energies, such as tornadoes, hurricanes, thunderstorms, lightning
storms, ice storms, dust storms, hailstorms, water spouts, blizzards, oceanic storms,
typhoons, torms, firestorms, dust devils, shindees, windstorms, squalls, gales, tropical
cyclones, tempests, storms on other worlds (e.g., Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, which is a
permanent anticyclone with wind speeds greater than those of Earthly hurricanes), etc.
Aquarius rules all cloud formations and related phenomena, especially odd clouds such
as lenticulars.

*The Van Allen radiation belt is a torus of energetic charged particles (plasma) around Earth, which is
held in place by Earth’s magnetic field. This field is not uniformly distributed around the Earth. On
the sunward side, it is compressed because of the solar wind, while on the other side it is elongated to
around three earth radii. This creates a cavity called the Chapman-Ferraro Cavity, in which the Van
Allen radiation belt resides. It is split into two distinct belts, with energetic electrons forming the
outer belt and a combination of protons and electrons creating the inner belt. In addition, the belts
contain lesser amounts of other nuclei, such as alpha particles. The Van Allen belts are closely related
to the polar aurora where particles strike the upper atmosphere and fluoresce.
Prior to the Space Age, the possibility of trapped charged particles had been investigated by
Kristian Birkeland, Carl Størmer, and Nicholas Christofilos. The existence of the belt was confirmed
by the Explorer 1 and Explorer 3 missions in early 1958, under Dr James Van Allen at the University
of Iowa. The trapped radiation was first mapped out by Explorer 4, Pioneer 3 and Luna 1.
The term Van Allen belts refers specifically to the radiation belts surrounding Earth; however,
similar radiation belts have been discovered around other planets. The Sun does not support long-
term radiation belts. The Earth’s atmosphere limits the belts’ particles to regions above 200 – 1,000
km, while the belts do not extend past 7 Earth radii RE. The belts are confined to an area which
extends about 65° from the celestial equator.
An upcoming NASA mission, Radiation Belt Storm Probes, will go further and gain scientific
understanding (to the point of predictability) of how populations of relativistic electrons and ions in
space form or change in response to changes in solar activity and the solar wind.

Outer Belt

The large outer radiation belt extends from an altitude of about three to ten Earth radii (RE)
above the Earth’s surface. Its greatest intensity is usually around 4 – 5 RE. The outer electron
radiation belt is mostly produced by the inward radial diffusion and local acceleration due to transfer
of energy from whistler mode plasma waves to radiation belt electrons. Radiation belt electrons are
also constantly removed by collisions with atmospheric neutrals, losses to magnetopause, and the
outward radial diffusion. The outer belt consists mainly of high energy(0.1 – 10 MeV) electrons
trapped by the Earth’s magnetosphere. The gyroradii for energetic protons would be large enough to
bring them into contact with the Earth’s atmosphere. The electrons here have a high flux and at the
outer edge (close to the magnetopause), where geomagnetic field lines open into the geomagnetic
“tail”, fluxes of energetic electrons can drop to the low interplanetary levels within about 100 km (a
decrease by a factor of 1,000).
The trapped particle population of the outer belt is varied, containing electrons and various ions.
Most of the ions are in the form of energetic protons, but a certain percentage are alpha particles and
O+ oxygen ions, similar to those in the ionosphere but much more energetic. This mixture of ions
suggests that ring current particles probably come from more than one source.
The outer belt is larger than the inner belt and its particle population fluctuates widely. Energetic
(radiation) particle fluxes can increase and decrease dramatically as a consequence of geomagnetic
storms, which are themselves triggered by magnetic field and plasma disturbances produced by the
Sun. The increases are due to storm-related injections and acceleration of particles from the tail of the
magnetosphere.
There is debate as to whether the outer belt was discovered by the U.S. Explorer 4 or the USSR
Sputnik 2/3.

Inner belt

The inner Van Allen Belt extends from an altitude of 100 – 10,000 km (0.01 to 1.5 Earth radii)
above the Earth’s surface, and contains high concentrations of energetic protons with energies
exceeding 100 MeV and electrons in the range of hundreds of keV, trapped by the strong (relative to
the outer belts) magnetic fields in the region.
It is believed that protons of energies exceeding 50 MeV in the lower belts at lower altitudes are
the result of the beta decay of neutrons created by cosmic ray collisions with nuclei of the upper
atmosphere. The source of lower energy protons is believed to be proton diffusion due to changes in
the magnetic field during geomagnetic storms.
Due to the slight offset of the belts from Earth’s geometric center, the inner Van Allen belt
makes its closest approach to the surface at the South Atlantic Anomaly.
In the belts, at a given point, the flux of particles of a given energy decreases sharply with
energy.
At the magnetic equator, electrons of energies exceeding 500 keV (respectively 5 MeV) have
omnidirectional fluxes ranging from 1.2×106 (respectively 3.7×104) up to 9.4×109 (respectively
2×107) particles per square centimeter per second.
The proton belts contain protons with kinetic energies ranging from about 100 keV (which can
penetrate 0.6 mm of lead) to over 400 MeV (which can penetrate 143 mm of lead).
Solar cells, integrated circuits, and sensors can be damaged by radiation. Geomagnetic storms
occasionally damage electronic components on spacecraft. Miniaturization and digitization of
electronics and logic circuits have made satellites more vulnerable to radiation, as incoming ions may
be as large as the circuit’s charge. Electronics on satellites must be hardened against radiation to
operate reliably. The Hubble Space Telescope, among other satellites, often has its sensors turned off
when passing through regions of intense radiation.
Missions beyond low earth orbit leave the protection of the geomagnetic field, and transit the
Van Allen belts. Thus they may need to be shielded against exposure to cosmic rays, Van Allen
radiation, or solar flares. The region between two to three earth radii lies between the two radiation
belts and is sometimes referred to as the “safe zone.”
A satellite shielded by 3 mm of aluminium in an elliptic orbit (200 by 20,000 miles) passing
through the radiation belts will receive about 2,500 rem (25 Sv) per year. Almost all radiation will be
received while passing the inner belt.
It is generally understood that the inner and outer Van Allen belts result from different processes.
The inner belt, consisting mainly of energetic protons, is the product of the decay of albedo neutrons
which are themselves the result of cosmic ray collisions in the upper atmosphere. The outer belt
consists mainly of electrons. They are injected from the geomagnetic tail following geomagnetic
storms, and are subsequently energized though wave-particle interactions. Particles are trapped in the
 Earth’s magnetic field because it is basically a magnetic mirror. Particles gyrate around field lines
and also move along field lines. As particles encounter regions of stronger magnetic field where field
lines converge, their “longitudinal” velocity is slowed and can be reversed, reflecting the particle.
This causes the particle to bounce back and forth between the Earth’s poles, where the magnetic field
increases.
A gap between the inner and outer Van Allen belts, sometimes called safe zone or safe slot, is
caused by the Very Low Frequency (VLF) waves which scatter particles in pitch angle which results
in the gain of particles to the atmosphere. Solar outbursts can pump particles into the gap but they
drain again in a matter of days. The radio waves were originally thought to be generated by
turbulence in the radiation belts, but recent work by James Green of the NASA Goddard Space Flight
Center comparing maps of lightning activity collected by the Micro Lab 1 spacecraft with data on
radio waves in the radiation-belt gap from the IMAGE spacecraft suggests that they are actually
generated by lightning within Earth’s atmosphere. The radio waves they generate strike the
ionosphere at the right angle to pass through it only at high latitudes, where the lower ends of the gap
approach the upper atmosphere. These results are still under scientific debate.
There have been nuclear tests in space that have caused artificial radiation belts. Starfish Prime,
a high altitude nuclear test, created an artificial radiation belt that damaged or destroyed as many as
one third of the satellites in low earth orbit at the time. Thomas Gold has argued that the outer belt is
left over from the aurora while Alex Dessler has argued that the belt is a result of volcanic activity.
In another view, the belts could be considered a flow of electric current that is fed by the solar
wind. With the protons being positive and the electrons being negative, the area between the belts is
sometimes subjected to a current flow, which “drains” away. The belts are also thought to drive
auroras, lightning and many other electrical effects.
The belts are a hazard for artificial satellites and are moderately dangerous for human beings, but
are difficult and expensive to shield against.
The physicists Robert P. Hoyt and Robert L. Forward proposed the concept HiVOLT (High
Voltage Orbiting Long Tether) as a potential means to drain the radiation belt of high energy
particles. The proposal involves deploying highly electrically charged tethers from satellites in orbit.
Charged particles within the radiation belt encountering these tethers would be deflected by their
large electrostatic fields onto paths that intersect with the atmosphere, where they would be
harmlessly dissipated. Simulations have suggested that the inner belt could be drained to 1% of its
natural electron flux within two months of HiVOLT operation.

Physical chemistry:

The rulers of Aquarius are Saturn and Uranus, respectively associated with the chemical
elements lead (Pb: atomic number 82; atomic weight 207; ordinal position in periodic table
81) and uranium (U: atomic number 92; atomic weight 238; ordinal position in periodic
table 91). Jupiter and Neptune, respectively associated with the chemical elements tin (Sn:
atomic number50; atomic weight 119; ordinal position in the periodic table 49) and
neptunium (Np: atomic number 93; atomic weight 237; ordinal position in periodic table
92), are exalted in it; and the esoteric ruler of Aquarius is associated with the chemical
element copper (Cu: atomic number 29; atomic weight 64; ordinal position in periodic
table 28*).
Any material in a gas phase is associated with Aquarius.
Lightning, an electrochemical phenomenon frequently occurring in the Earth’s
atmosphere, is associated with Aquarius.

*This is one of those odd Qaballistic coincidences that occur with such striking frequency among the
chemical elements. Venus is associated with Sephirah 7, Netzach, and with Key 14, Daleth,
connecting Sephirah 2, Chokmah, with Sephirah 3, Binah. The numerical value of Daleth is 4. 4 x 7
= 28, which is a perfect number, since the sum of the integral divisors of 28, 1 + 2 + 4 + 7 + 14, is
also equal to 28. On the other hand 29, copper’s atomic number, is a prime whose digits add to 11,
the Key Number of Aleph, the Path associated with the Element Air and the planet Uranus, which is
 one of the rulers of Aquarius. The numerology of the physical chemistry of Venus’s relationship to
Aquarius is complex, but telling.

Colors:

Liber 777 gives, for the King Scale of color, violet; for the Queen Scale of color, sky
blue; for the Emperor Scale of color, bluish mauve; and for the Empress Scale of color,
white, tinged purple.*
Other assignments include those associated with water, such as turquoise, aqua, blue-
green, and silver; electric blue and electric hues in general; ashy color with blue; and grey,
presumably because it is associated with heavy weather and the clouds covering the sky
during storms and periods of precipitation.

*In Aleister Crowley, 777 and Other Qabalistic Writings of Aleister Crowley, Including Gematria &
Sepher Sephiroth (edited and with an Introduction by Israel Regardie. York Beach, ME: Samuel
Weiser, Inc., 1973, 1977, 1986, 1994). See Columns XV-XVIII of Liber 777 for the Color Scales,
accessed by Key Numbers of the various Sephiroth and Paths.

Gods:

Greek: Zeus’s Eagle; Ganymede, Zeus’s cup-bearer; Pallas Athena; Ouranos, God of the
Sky; the Titans, the children of Ouranos and Gaia
Roman: Juno; Jupiter (IAO-Pater); Minerva; Caelus, personification of the sky, equivalent
to the Greek Ouranos
Egyptian: Nuit, Ahephi, Aroueris
Babylonian: Enki
Sumerian: Ea
USA:
Celtic:

Great Father : The Horned God, The Lord. Lord of the winter, harvest, land of the
dead, the sky, animals, mountains, lust, powers of destruction, regeneration. Represents
the male principle of creation.
Gwydion (Gwyddion): Location: Wales. Druid of the mainland gods, son of Don.
Brother of Govannon, Arianrhod and Amaethon. Wizard and Bard of North Wales. A
many-skilled god. Prince of the Powers of Air, a shape-shifter. His symbol was a white
horse. Greatest of the enchanters. A warrior-magician. Brought pigs to humankind.
Rules over illusion, changes, Magick, the sky, healing, music Magick, help, learning,
mental powers.
Nwyrve: Location: Wales. Husband of Arianrhod, about whom nothing is known
aside his name. Most likely a father sky God at one time.
Sirona (Dirona): Location: Britain. “Star.” Goddess of many of the beneficial hot
springs in southern France from which her few legends came. Also a Sky Goddess and
most likely deity of the Sun. Mother of Borvo, who took Her position in patriarchal
times. Rules Over: Healing, purification.
Tannus (Tinnus, Taranus): Location: Britain. Thunder God. In early Gaul human
sacrifices were offered to Him to influence the weather. He was also God of the wheel
as well as God of Fertility and a Sky God.
Camalus: Celtic God of the Sky and War
 Arianrhod: Wales. Goddess of beauty, fertility, and reincarnation. Known as Silver
Wheel and the High Fruitful Mother, the palace of this sky Goddess was Caer
Arianrhold (Aurora Borealis).
Cailleach Bheur: Scotland, Ireland, Manx. The Great Goddess in Her Destroyer
aspect, called “the Veiled One.” Another name for Her is Scota, from which Scotland
comes. In parts of Britain She is the Goddess of Winter. She was an ancient Goddess of
the pre-Celtic peoples of Ireland. She controlled the seasons and the weather; and was
the Goddess of Earth and sky, Moon and Sun.

Hindu: Indra, Varuna (often identified with the Greek Ouranos)

Buddhism:
Voudon:
SubGenius:
Discordianism:
H. P. Lovecraft:
Stephen King:
LaVeyan Satanism:
Szekely (Romany Gypsy):
Chinese:
Japanese:
Judaism:
Christianity:
Islam:
Scandinavian/Norse: Thor, the maker and wielder of the Thunderbolt (a meteorite rather
than lightning) and God of thunder. In general, all the Aesir are Gods of consciousness
and the sky.
The French Enlightenment:
Russian:
Hungarian:
African:
Southeast Asia:
Oceania:

Abeguwo, Melanesian sky Goddess

Amai-te-rangi, sky demon/God of Mangaia
Atua I Kafika, supreme sky God of Polynesian mythology
Ira, Polynesian sky Goddess
Laufakana’a, Tongan creator God and sky father
Tangaloa, Tongan sky God
Afa: The Samoan Storm-God.
Ahoeitu: A legendary King Tonga, grandson of Kohai who may have been a
primeval earth serpent. The Sky-God Eitumatupua descended from heaven one day and
married Ilaheva, an earth-goddess. Until their son Ahoeitu was full grown, he had never
seen his father, who lived in heaven. Eitumatupua had begotten other sons in heaven
who were jealous when Eitumatupua mentioned his earth-son, so they ambushed
Ahoeitu and devoured him. As soon as Eutumatupua discovered this conspiracy, he
summoned all his heavenly sons to him and ordered them to vomit. As soon as he had
all the pieces of Ahoeitu gathered together, he rejoined them using magin herbs, and
Ahoeitu came to life again. He was given the kingdom of Tonga as recompense for his
pain.
Amai-te-rangi: A Polynesian deity of the sky who ‘angles’ for mortals on earth,
pulling them up in baskets to devour them.
Ao: The God of Clouds.
Apu Hau: A God of storms. God of the ‘Fierce Squall’.
Apu Matangi: The Maori God of storms, God of the ‘Howling Rainfall’.
Ara Tiotio (or Awhiowhio): The Polynesian God of the Whirlwind and Tornado.
Atea: (“Space”) Atea was the Sky-God in the cosmology of the people of Tuamotu.
He married Fa’ahotu. Their first son was Tahu, “Knowledge,” who became a great
 Magickian. Their second son was Tane, according to some versions of the myth, and
another son was Ro’o. Tane and Atea were later cocked in a deadly struggle, like Zeus
and Kronos. Finally Tane, using the thunderbolt Fatu-Titi, slew Atea, Many kings of the
Tuamotu islands trace their descent to Atea.
Awha: The Maori Storm-God.
Laufakanaa: In the mythology of Ata, one of the Tongan islands, Laufakanaa is the
God of winds. The heavenly God Tamapo sent Laufakanaa down to earth to rule the
winds. He landed on Ata and became its ruler. The skipper of all Tongan vessels would
pray to Laufakanaa for favorable winds and would even visit Ata with offerings of bread
and coconut oil to appease the god’s stormy temper. Laufakanaa brought the banana tree
from heaven and taught the Tongans the art of fishing with a net and of making the
nets. His name means ‘Speaking’ (lau) and ‘Peace’, just as the wind in the Pacific is
quiet one moment and roaring the next.
Lono (Hawaii): God of the sky, rain, and agriculture who descended on a rainbow to
marry a Hawaiian girl who became the Goddess Laka.
Maomao: The great wind-god, father of the many storm-god, including “howling
rainfall” and “fierce squall.”
Rangi: God of the upper sky, originally coupled to his wife’s Papa, the Goddess of
the Earth, but separated by their children, mainly Tane the God of Forests whose trees
pushed the couple apart and provide a space between the brown earth and the blue sky,
to make room for creatures to walk and fly.
Rehua: The star-god, son of Rangi and Papa, ancestor of the demiGod Maui.
Rongo-mai: God of comets and whales.
Tane: Son of Rangi, the sky-God and himself the God of artisans and boat builders.
He is also the God of Light (especially to underwater swimmers because to skin divers
light is where life is), the God of artistic beauty, the God of the Forest, and Lord of the
Fairies. As creator in one of his minor forms, he is the God of Hope.
Tawhaki: God of Thunder and Lightning. Tawhaki gives birth to Uira (lightning)
out of his armpits. Tawhaki is also the God of Good Health, an artisan God particularly
adept at building houses and plaiting decorative mats.
(New Zealand) God of clouds and thunder.
Tawhiri-matea: The God of Storms and Winds, leveler of forests, wave-whipper.
Ua: The Rain God, whose many sons and daughters, such as “long rains” and
“short rains” are responsible for providing the earth with water.
Uira: Lightning (see Tawhaki)

Native Australian:

Altjira: In Australian Aboriginal mythology, Altjira is the sky God of the Arrernte.
He was the central God of the Dream time (called Alchera by the Aranda) who created
the Earth, then retired to the sky. In art, he is depicted as having an emus feet. His wives
and daughters have dog’s feet.
Baiame: In Australian aboriginal mythology, Baiame is the ancestor and patron
God of the Kamilaroi. He is a sky God and a deity of death and life, and a God of rain
and the shamans. He is married to Birrahgnooloo, with whom he has a son Daramulum.
It is taboo among the Australian natives to mention or discuss the name of Baiame in
public.
Daramulum: In Australian aboriginal mythology (specifically: Wiradyuri and
Kamilaroi), Daramulum (“one legged”) is a son of Baiame and Birrahgnooloo. He is a
sky and weather god, patron of shamans, and a lunar deity.
Numakulla: In Australian aboriginal mythology, the Numakulla (or Numbakulla)
were two sky gods who created all life on Earth, including humans, from the Inapertwa.
Afterwards, they became lizards. The Numakulla are sometimes described as a dual-
aspect deity rather than two separate deities.

Eskimo: Torngasoak, a very powerful sky God, one of the more important deities
Central American:
American Indian:
 American folklore:
Science-fiction:
The Land of Oz:

Buddhist meditation: Purple corpse.

Biblical associations:

Job 9:7-10, 38:31-32, the Mazzaroth (Zodiac)

Thaddeus-Jude, one of the twelve Apostles and disciples of Christ, is traditionally
believed to have been an Aquarius. He considered the lot of the peasant, and strove to better
the living and working conditions of the masses; and he interrogated Jesus during the Last
Supper as to how he would manifest himself.*
The twelve layers of the foundation walls of the New Jerusalem in Revelations 21:19-20
are to be built of jacinth, a stone the color of hyacinth.**
The descriptions of the twelve sons of Jacob, listed at birth in Genesis 29, who became
the chiefs of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, make it clear that each one of these men was one of
the twelve astrological types; by that information, we find that Joseph was probably an
Aquarius.†

*Nicholas de Vore, Encyclopedia of Astrology (New York: Philosophical Library,1947), p. 360.

**Ibid., p. 361.

†Ibid., 360-361.

Greek mythology:

The 11th Labor of Hercules, was bringing back the golden apples from the garden of the
Hesperides.*

*Ibid., p. 362. Hercules (Herakles) was celebrated for his strength in fulfilling the twelve tasks, each
requiring superhuman strength for its successful completion, assigned to him by Eurystheus, because
of the hatred of Hera, wife of Zeus, for Alcmene, the mother of Hercules by Zeus. Each of these tasks
may be correlated with one of the twelve signs of the Zodiac, each of which has mythological
associations.

Countries:

Barbara Watters gives the Arabian Desert, Russia (at least after the Bolshevik
Revolution of 1918; other authorities give Taurus or Capricorn as Russia’s rulers),
Afghanistan, Tibet, Prussia, “the parts of Poland bordering it,” and Sweden. She notes that
this sign has a powerful influence upon the affairs of the United States of America and
England.*
Geraldine Davis gives Communist Russia, Arabia, Sweden, Prussia, Lithuania, part of
Poland, Abyssinia, Piedmont.**
Alan Oken gives Sweden, Ethiopia, Prussia, Russia, Lithuania, Westphalia, Canada,
and parts of Arabia and Poland.†
*Barbara Watters,. Horary Astrology and the Judgment of Events (Washington, DC: Valhalla
Paperbacks, Ltd., 1973), p. 34.

**Geraldine Davis, A Modern Scientific Textbook on Horary Astrology, With Authentic Charts and
Predictions (Los Angeles: Tate Printing Company, 1942), p. 36.

†Alan Oken, Alan Oken’s Complete Astrology, revised edition (New York: Bantam Books, 1988; ISBN
0-553-34537-0), p. 153.

Cities:

Barbara Watters gives Hamburg, Bremen, Berlin, and Moscow.*

Geraldine Davis gives Brighton, Salisbury, Trent, Bremen, and Hamburg.**
Alan Oken gives Hamburg, Bremen, Salzburg, Trent, Stockholm, and Leningrad.†
At least to some extent, Aquarius is also associated with New York City because of that
city’s cosmopolitan nature; the same might be said of Tokyo, Seattle, Washington (a.k.a.
“Jet City”), Hong Kong, and London.

*Watters, op. cit., p. 34.

**Davis, op. cit., p. 36.

†Oken, op. cit., p. 153.

Magickal Power: Astrology*

*Liber 777, Column XLV.

Musical tone: A sharp or B flat.*

*Bill Butler, Dictionary of the Tarot (New York: Schocken Books, 1975, 1977; ISBN 0-8052-0559-4), p.
174, under the interpretation of Paul Foster Case of Trump XVII, The Star.

Qlippoth:

Behemiron or Bahimiron (The Bestial Ones): These can be evoked to banish gossip,
make wishes come true, bring confidence, get what you desire, know others plans, to know
someone’s desires, bring chaos, cause change, bring about the unexpected, to reveal
something unknown. These Qlippothim are destructive; they breaks barriers and blocks;
they are associated with strange energies and awakening energies, and give occult
knowledge. They also can hide Magickal Workings, and animate the dead.
Also, Tzuflifu: a demon that opens portals, and moves anywhere through time and
space, he is like a guide. He gives access to the universal mind, other dimensions, occult
knowledge, the black flame awakened, illumination, darker Fey Magick. He is associated
 with evolution on the Path to become godlike, gives protection, gives the wisdom of the
initiated, is associated with the drive to succeed in something, provides means for a given
end, is associated with movement to desired a end, and enables the successful
accomplishment of endeavors.

Legendary orders of being: Water nymphs, undines, sirens, Lorelei, mermaids

Alchemical references:

Decomposition of materials into their Airy and Fixed components.

.Metals, stones, elements, and minerals:

Precious and semiprecious stones include garnet, amethyst, moss agate, opal and
sugilite.
Liber 777 gives artificial glass, that is, glasses not occurring naturally, which are
produced through industrial processes.*
Alan Oken gives blue sapphire, black pearl, obsidian, and slate for Aquarius, and
amber, jacinth, uranium, and, according to Manley P. Hall, to some extent the gems of the
Sun and Venus for Uranus, ruler of Aquarius.**
George Frederick Kunz gives the garnet and amethyst. †
As given above, the rulers of Aquarius are Saturn and Uranus, respectively associated
with the chemical elements lead (Pb: atomic number 82; atomic weight 207; ordinal
position in periodic table 81) and uranium (U: atomic number 92; atomic weight 238;
ordinal position in periodic table 91). Jupiter and Neptune, respectively associated with the
chemical elements tin (Sn: atomic number50; atomic weight 119; ordinal position in the
periodic table 49) and neptunium (Np: atomic number 93; atomic weight 237; ordinal
position in periodic table 92), are exalted in it; and the esoteric ruler of Aquarius is
associated with the chemical element copper (Cu: atomic number 29; atomic weight 64;
ordinal position in periodic table 28*). Minerals composed prominently of these elements
are associated with Aquarius.
Fulgarite and lechatelierite,‡ minerals created by lightning striking the ground in areas
rich in minerals which can be converted into these “fossilized lightning strikes.”
Radium (Ra, atomic number 88), radon gas (Rn, atomic number 86), the actinides or
actinoids (the 14 chemical elements with atomic numbers from 90 to 103, thorium to
lawrencium)

*Liber 777, Column XL.

**Oken, op. cit., pp. 152, 218.

†George Frederick Kunz, The Curious Lore of Precious Stones: An Illustrated Guide to the History and
Powers of Gemstones (New York: Bell Publishing Company, 1989; ISBN 0-517-67943-4),

‡Lechatelierite is considered a mineraloid because it lacks a crystal structure. It is actually made of fused
silica; SiO2. Quartz is also made of silica, but it has a crystalline structure. Basically lechatelierite is
glass! However, it differs from regular glass by virtue of its natural origins. Lechatelierite is also not
the same as obsidian. Although obsidian is considered a natural glass it is not pure SiO2. And
although lechatelierite is sometimes formed as a result of meteorite impacts like tektites, they are not
the same. Unless the tektites are very pure silica as in the case of a variety called Libyan Glass (see
above). To sum all of this up, lechatelierite is natural, pure or nearly pure, silica glass.
Lechatelierite has three different origins: Meteorite impacts, volcanism and lightning strikes. The
meteorite impacts simply fused quartz grains in the impacted rocks with the incredible pressures that
they generate. The volcanism origin is the same as for obsidian, where molten rock cools too quickly
for a crystalline structure to form. But as was explained before, obsidian is generally a mix of several
chemistries besides SiO2. The lightning strike origin is perhaps the most interesting.
 When lightning strikes the earth in sandy areas such as deserts or sandy beaches, the intense heat
and energy of the bolt will fuse the sand grains in a milli-second. A branching, hollow, glassy tube is
sometimes the result. These “fossil” lightning strikes are composed of lechatelierite and occasionally
fused biotite or other minerals. They are referred to as fulgarites and are certainly a natural history
oddity. Fulgarites have been found that were several feet in length, although most are a few inches
long by a half inch thick.

Plants, real and imaginary:

John Lust gives frankincense and myrrh,* presumably because the three Magi visited
Jesus when the Sun was in Aquarius (60-30 days before the Spring Equinox) and gave him
gifts of those herbs.
Liber 777 gives the olive and the coconut.**
The mandrake (Mandragora officinarum, which belongs to the nightshades family
(Solanaceae)) is associated with this sign because its root has a roughly manlike shape.†
Epiphytes. An epiphyte is a plant that grows upon another plant, such as a tree, non-
parasitically, or, in some cases, upon some an inanimate structure, such as a building or a
telegraph wire. Epiphytes derive moisture and nutrients from the air and rain, and
sometimes from debris accumulating around it. epiphytes are is found in both temperate
zones, such as many mosses, liverworts, lichens and algae, and in the tropics, e.g., numerous
many ferns, cacti, orchids, and bromeliads. They are also called “air plants.”

*John Lust, The Herb Book (New York: Bantam Books, 1974; ISBN 0-553-26770-1), p. 574.

**Liber 777, Column XXXIX.

†Because mandrake contains deliriant hallucinogenic tropane alkaloids such as atropine, scopolamine,
apoatropine, hyoscyamine and the roots sometimes contain bifurcations causing them to resemble
human figures, their roots have long been used in magic rituals, today also in neopagan religions such
as Wicca and Germanic revivalism religions such as Odinism.
The Arabs called the mandrake (Mandragora officinarum) luffâh, or beid el-jinn (“djinn’s
eggs”). The parsnip-shaped root of the plant is often branched. At ground level this root sprouts a
rosette of ovate-oblong to ovate, wrinkled, crisp, sinuate-dentate to entire leaves, 5-40 centimeters
(2.0-16 in) long, somewhat resembling those of the tobacco-plant. A number of one-flowered nodding
peduncles spring from the neck bearing whitish-green flowers, nearly 5 centimeters (2.0 in) broad,
which produce globular, succulent, orange to red berries, resembling small tomatoes, which ripen in
late spring. All parts of the mandrake plant are poisonous. The plant is native to southern and central
Europe and lands around the Mediterranean Sea, as well as on Corsica.
In Genesis 30, Reuben, the eldest son of Jacob and Leah, finds mandrakes in a field. Rachel,
Jacob’s infertile second wife and Leah’s sister, is desirous of the mandrakes and barters with Leah for
them. The trade offered by Rachel is for Leah to spend the next night in Jacob’s bed in exchange for
Leah’s mandrakes. Leah gives away the plant to her barren sister, but soon after this (Genesis 30:14-
22), Leah, who had previously had four sons but had been infertile for a long while, became pregnant
once more and in time gave birth to two more sons, Issachar and Zebulun, and a daughter, Dinah.
Only years after this episode of her asking for the mandrakes did Rachel manage to get pregnant.
There are classical Jewish commentaries which suggest that mandrakes help barren women to
conceive a child though.
In Hebrew, mandrake is ‫( דודאים‬dûdã’im), meaning “love plant.” In certain Asian cultures, it is
believed to ensure conception. Most interpreters believe Mandragora officinarum to be the plant
referred to in Genesis 30:14 (“love plant”) and Song of Songs 7:13 (“the mandrakes send out their
fragrance”). (A number of other plants have been suggested as more likely references, instead, such
as blackberries, Zizyphus Lotus, the sidr of the Arabs, the banana, lily, citron, and fig.)
 Sir Thomas Browne, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Chapter. VII, suggests that the “dudai’im” of
Genesis 30:14 is really the opium poppy, because the word ‘dudai’im’ may be a reference to a
woman’s breasts.
According to the legend, when the root of the mandrake is dug up it screams, the scream killing
all who hear it. Literature on the subject includes complex directions for harvesting a mandrake root
in relative safety. For example Josephus (c. 37 AD Jerusalem – c. 100) gives the following directions
for pulling it up:

“A furrow must be dug around the root until its lower part is exposed, then a dog is
tied to it, after which the person tying the dog must get away. The dog then endeavors to
follow him, and so easily pulls up the root, but dies suddenly instead of his master. After
this the root can be handled without fear.

Extract from Eliphas Levi, Witchcraft and Spells: Transcendental Magic its Doctrine and Ritual,
Chapter XVI (A Complete Translation of Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie . Arthur Edward Waite,
translator, 1896):

“… [We] will add a few words about mandragores (mandrakes) and androids, which
several writers on magic confound with the waxen image; serving the purposes of
bewitchment. The natural mandragore is a filamentous root which, more or less,
presents as a whole either the figure of a man, or that of the virile members. It is slightly
narcotic, and an aphrodisiacal virtue was ascribed to it by the ancients, who represented
it as being sought by Thessalian sorcerers for the composition of 26organize. Is this root
the umbilical vestige of our terrestrial origin ? We dare not seriously affirm it, but all the
same it is certain that man came out of the slime of the earth, and his first appearance
must have been in the form of a rough sketch. The analogies of nature make this notion
necessarily admissible, at least as a possibility. The first men were, in this case, a family
of gigantic, sensitive mandragores, animated by the sun, who rooted themselves up from
the earth ; this assumption not only does not exclude, but, on the contrary, positively
supposes, creative will and the providential co-operation of a first cause, which we have
reason to call God. Some alchemists, impressed by this idea, speculated on the culture of
the mandragore, and experimented in the artificial reproduction of a soil sufficiently
fruitful and a sun sufficiently active to 26organize the said root, and thus create men
without the concurrence of the female. (See: Homunculus) Others, who regarded
humanity as the synthesis of animals, despaired about organized26 the mandragore, but
they crossed monstrous pairs and projected human seed into animal earth, only for the
production of shameful crimes and barren deformities. The third method of making the
android was by galvanic machinery. One of these almost intelligent automata was
attributed to Albertus Magnus, and it is said that St Thomas (Thomas Aquinas)
destroyed it with one blow from a stick because he was perplexed by its answers. This
story is an allegory; the android was primitive scholasticism, which was broken by the
Summa of St Thomas, the daring innovator who first substituted the absolute law of
reason for arbitrary divinity, by formulating that axiom which we cannot repeat too
often, since it comes from such a master: “ A thing is not just because God wills it, but
God wills it because it is just. The real and serious android of the ancients was a secret
which they kept hidden from all eyes, and Mesmer was the first who dared to divulge it;
it was the extension of the will of the magus into another body, organized and served by
an elementary spirit; in more modern and intelligible terms, it was a magnetic subject.

It was a common folklore in some countries that mandrake would only grow where the semen of
a hanged man had dripped on to the ground; this would appear to be the reason for the methods
employed by the alchemists who “projected human seed into animal earth.” In Germany, the plant is
known as the Alraune: the novel Alraune by Hanna Heinz Ewers, which was later adapted as a film,
is based on a soulless woman conceived from a hanged man’s semen, the title referring to this myth
of the Mandrake’s origins.
The following is taken from Paul Christian, The History and Practice of Magic (1963), pp. 402 –
403:
 Would you like to make a Mandragora, as powerful as the homunculus (little man
in a bottle) so praised by Paracelsus? Then find a root of the plant called bryony. Take it
out of the ground on a Monday (the day of the moon), a little time after the vernal
equinox. Cut off the ends of the root and bury it at night in some country churchyard in
a dead man’s grave. For thirty days water it with cow’s milk in which three bats have
been drowned. When the thirty-first day arrives, take out the root in the middle of the
night and dry it in an oven heated with branches of verbena; then wrap it up in a piece
of a dead man’s winding-sheet and carry it with you everywhere.

Animals, Real and Imaginary:

The preeminent animal of Aquarius is Man. Aquarius is one of the strictly human
signs, and as the Cherubic member of the Airy signs, its icon is the signature for all three of
them. With the Eagle of Scorpio, the Lion of Leo, and the Bull of Taurus, the Man of
Aquarius stands as one of the four great Angels of the astrological signs. All those creatures
with generally man-like forms which use their forepaws as hands might be associated with
Aquarius, e.g., all primates, especially baboons and the great apes; bears who are bipedal at
least part of the time, such as grizzlies (Ursus arctos horribilis), etc. Vampire bats* might
also be associated with Aquarius, because of their manlike shape (minus the wings),
advanced social behavior, and their high intelligence.
Liber 777 gives Man, Eagle (Cherub of Air), and the Peacock.** (Eagle, because
Aquarius is an Air sign, and the Peacock, because of the gorgeous cyan of its feathers, so like
the sky.)

*Vampire bats are bats whose food source is blood, a dietary trait called hematophagy. There are three bat
species that feed solely on blood: the common vampire bat (Desmodus rotundus), the hairy-legged
vampire bat (Diphylla ecaudata), and the white-winged vampire bat (Diaemus youngi). All three
species are native to the Americas, ranging from Mexico to Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. Because of
differences between the three species, they have each been placed within a different genus, each
consisting of one species. In the older literature, these three genera were placed within a family of
their own, Desmodontidae, but taxonomists have now grouped them as a subfamily, the
Desmodontinae, in the American leaf-nosed bat family, Phyllostomidae.
The fact that the three known species of vampire bat all seem more similar to one another than to
any other species suggests that sanguivorous habits (feeding on blood) evolved only once, and that the
three species may share a common ancestor.
Vampire bats are believed to be the only species of bats in the world to “adopt” another young bat
if something happens to the bat’s mother. Vampire bats also share a strong family bond with
members of the colony, which is believed to be why they are the only bats to take up this adoption
characteristic. Another unique adaptation of vampire bats is the sharing of food. A vampire bat can
only survive about two days without a meal of blood, yet they cannot be guaranteed of finding food
every night. This poses a problem, so when a bat fails to find food it will often ask another bat for
food. The host bat may regurgitate a small amount of blood to sustain the other member of the colony.
This has been noted by many naturalists as an example of reciprocal altruism in nature.

**Liber 777, Column XXXVIII.

Creatures in general:

Foods, drugs, flavors, and perfumes:

 Perfumes: Liber 777 gives Galbanum*
Drugs: Liber 777 gives diuretics.**
Food: angel-food cake (for its airy lightness)

*Liber 777, Column XLII.

**Liber 777, Column XLIII.

Clothing, Magickal Weapons, and other things, commodities/products, objects, and processes:

Magickal Weapon: The Censer or Aspergillus*

Things, commodities/products, objects: aircraft
Processes: Everything connected to atmospheric dynamics and the chemistry of the
atmosphere
For things, Barbara Watters gives the winds; aircraft; parliaments; electronics;
radioactivity; radium; x-rays; radios, the telegraph; the metals aluminum (Al, atomic
number13) and uranium (U, atomic number 92); belfries; spires; lightning rods; clouds;
kites; balloons; outer space and space research; physics; thermodynamics; astronomy;
assemblies; labor unions; civil rights; adoption; hurricanes; riots; street demonstrations;
antiques, especially old books; elections; sociology and social theory; revolution; social
experiments; aviation and airlines; reorganization, especially of corporations; mergers and
conglomerates; fraternal organizations, such as the Moose, Elks, Rotary clubs, the Masons,
the Ordo Templi Orientis, etc.**
Other: The US Senate; radon gas, the actinides or actinoids (the 14 chemical elements
with atomic numbers from 90 to 103, thorium to lawrencium); protests; polls;
sociobiology; socialization, i.e., the raising of our young to be functionally socialized;
airports; heaven; cooperatives, communes, communities; Communism; television; the
Internet and the World Wide Web; the Blogosphere; spam (bulk email sent out to try to
garner customers); email scams, e.g. Nigerian scams.

*Liber 777, Column XLI.

**Watters, op. cit., pp. 33-34.

The body:

The calves and ankles, and the circulatory system.

Liber 777 gives the kidneys and bladder. As malfunctions of these organs can lead to
ailments related to circulation and to edema, which is often expressed in the ankles and
calves, this is an appropriate assignment for Aquarius.
According to Ivy M. Goldstein-Jacobson, Aquarius is the disintegrating principle,
governing the “ethers of the body (the space-filling medium through which the electric
vibrations of life are diffused); gases; ethers and allotropic* oxygen (ozone [O3]), as found
in the bloodstream. The symbol “represents the etheric vibration of life flowing both toward
and away from the heart at the same time, as shown by the venous circulation of the
bloodstream flowing toward the air-filled lungs, and the arterial circulation” flowing away
from them, “purified by the Gemini oxygenation it contacted there.” Aquarius rules “the
main nerve network that can be demoralized spasmodically”; the shins and ankles; and the
 pituitary gland. Mercury rules oxygen, and Uranus rules the power to “disintegrate through
oxygenation” [i.e., oxidation of tissues, for better or worse].**

*Allotropy or allotropism is the property of some chemical elements to exist in two or more different
forms, known as allotropes of these elements. Allotropes are different structural modifications of an
element[1]; the element’s atoms are bonded together in a different manner. Examples include, e.g.,
the various forms of carbon, such as common soot, graphite, diamond, and fullerenes, such as
buckyballs. The term allotropy is used only for elements, not chemical compounds. The more
general term, used for any crystalline material, is polymorphism.

**Ivy M. Goldstein-Jacobson, Simplified Horary Astrology (Alhambra, California: Frank Severy

Publishing, 1960), pp. 192-193.

Diseases:

Weakness or crippling of the legs; leg cramps; broken or sprained ankles; circulatory
disorders; infectious diseases that affect or whose pathogens are carried in the circulatory
system, e.g., osteomylitis, malaria, leukemia.
Barbara Watters gives the above, plus radiation poisoning.*
According to Ivy M. Goldstein-Jacobson, If Uranus is badly afflicted in the chart, and
the ailment can’t be cured by cleansing of the blood, then it is incurable. The pathologies of
Aquarius are peculiar, disorganizing, spasmodic, uncommon, crippling, or paralyzing. They
include debilitating and nervous diseases; hiccoughs; paroxysms, convulsions, fits
[seizures], epilepsy, cramps, leg ache, weak ankles, and varicose veins; sensitive skin; early
graying of hair; disorders of the eyes, and incurable ailments.**
Aquarius is associated with restless leg syndrome. It rules progeria (rapid aging, so that
even very young children with the condition may be wizened and aged-looking, and death
usually comes at a young age from the conditions generally associated with advanced age)
and antigeria (a condition in which the signs of aging are absent until well into late middle
age).
According to Geraldine Davis, Aquarius is associated with the causes of illness will
come from circulatory problems or mental problems. She says that all spasmodic and
nervous complaints are indicated by Aquarius. She says that, as is the case for all Airy
signs, health is weakened by worry and nervous complaints, and that health is improved
through mental rest and changes of scenery. For planets in the Sixth House of the horoscope
and in Aquarius, she gives:

Mercury: Hysteria and general debility of the nervous system.

Venus: Hysteria; anemia; deteriorated quality of the blood. Venus in Aquarius
“weakens the red blood corpuscles, causing dropsy.”
Mars: Erysipelas; blood poisoning; varicose veins in the legs; ulcers of the legs;
palpitations of the heart.
Jupiter: Blood poisoning; lumbago [lower back pain]; “over-abundance of the
blood in the system” [presumably too great a production of red blood cells,
which can jam the arteries and cause major problems].
Saturn: Spinal trouble; weak circulation of the blood; problems with the eyes,
ankles, or legs; cramps; anemia.
Uranus: Nervous disorders; hysteria; cramps in the ankles; varicose veins.
Neptune: Obsession; nervous afflictions.†

Pluto badly afflicted in the 6th House of the natal horoscope or in a horary chart indicates
general debility that must be worked with throughout life is health is to improve and be
maintained. If Pluto is simultaneously afflicted by Uranus and/or Saturn (the traditional
 ruler of Aquarius), the native may suffer lifelong depression, tending to despair and/or
paranoid schizophrenia as the body and mind fight to throw off the depression any way they
can, and will never feel wholly secure. Power will always be an important issue for such
people, and there may be mental and/or sexual pathologies involving such issues, ranging
from dominance-and-bondage or sadomasochistic conditions to extremes such as serial
murder, arson, or other repeated violent crimes, especially if Chiron is also afflicted and/or
afflicting Pluto. The chance that the native was chronically abused as a child or was
otherwise severely emotionally traumatized at some point in his or her life, say, sustaining
PTSD as a result of military service, abduction by criminals or terrorists, or as a political
prisoner or a prisoner of war, is high.

*Watters, op. cit., p. 33.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 193.

† Davis, op. cit., pp. 192-199.

Psychology:

Natives of Aquarius tend to be nervous, active, talkative, inventive, democratic, rational,

obedient, reforming, interested in the sciences and advanced technology, dogmatic,
intellectual, and/or argumentative.

Magickal image: The figure of a water-nymph disporting herself.

*Liber 777, Column CLXXXI.

Patterns and compounds of color:

Speckled, dotted, and otherwise odd patterns of color on monochromatic backgrounds;

electric blue or pink against a background of black; patterns compounded of red, black,
and/or white (“alarm” colors which signal to other creatures that they should stay away from
the organism bearing those colors, e.g., monarch butterflies, which taste horrible and are
toxic because of their milkweed diet; skunks, which exude a foul odor; widow spiders,
which are extremely venomous; coral snakes, brightly-colored organisms whose venom is an
extremely potent neurotoxin, etc.)

Forms, shapes, lineal figures, geomantic figures, figures related to pure number, other
mathematical entities, and numerological associations:

Geomantic figure: Tristitia*

Fractal mathematics, chaos science

*Liber 777, Column XLIX.

Magick Square:
 A 28 x 28 Magick Square; a 90 x 90 Magick Square

Domain: The Airy regions of the globe and the universe at large

Archangels: Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael

Point of the compass: west by north.

Occupations, businesses, and ecological niches:

Human occupations and those who work in them include, e.g., aviation and aviators;
elected representatives; astronauts; astronomers; physicists; cosmologists; sociologists;
radio and television commentators and technicians; political orators and rhetoricians;
demagogues; adopted children; revolutionaries; eccentric people, especially if old;
reformers; labor organizers; collectors and curators of antiques and old books; people
engaged in mass marketing; spammers; public relations; engineering; rocket scientists
and others connected with the space industry; those who work with guided missiles; the US
Air Force and its members;

Places, nations, and peoples:

Peoples: Citizens and natives of the United States of America, its territories, and its
lands; American Indians;
Places: Those that are hilly or uneven; newly excavated or freshly plowed fields; great
open holes, such as quarries, especially those of marble or limestone; archaeological
diggings; fossil beds. In houses, it signifies the roofs, especially if they are turreted or
uneven; the eaves; castellations; rooms in turrets; widows’ walks; high balconies; places
built on roofs, such as pigeon cotes, penthouses, air-conditioning units, roof gardens;
ventilators; and places near windows which are drafty and airy. With respect to real estate,
Aquarius rules hilly, windswept land; apartments or offices on upper floors; club houses or
halls used for public meetings; property of interest to antiquarians; very modern houses
using novel construction methods or materials.

Matters of the horoscope:

Democracy; Communism and Communists; popular movements; the people; the

masses; humanitarianism; revolution, rebellion, reform; breakthrough science and
technology; the space industry, the exploration and colonization of space; astrology;
astronomy, physics, paleobiology, cosmology, astrobiology, hard ecology; modern electronic
media such as the telegraph, telephone, Internet, World Wide Web, Blogosphere, television,
radio, iPhones, iPods, cell phones, etc.; computer networks; Internet servers; unselfish love
not tainted with passive-aggressiveness; weather, climate, storms of all kinds, clouds, all
other meteorological conditions; all astronomical phenomena; luck given by God, as
opposed to luck one makes for oneself; trust funds; the outcome of all matters related to the
8th House, such as successful probate of wills, forensic investigations, tax audits, etc.;
Heaven (as opposed to Hell, which is ruled by Pisces and the 12 th House); adoption, adopted
children; the US Senate; elected representatives; demagogues; rhetoricians; modern
watches and other timepieces, especially those powered by computer chips, atomic clocks,
and other advanced timepieces; evolutionary biology, cladistics, paleontology, paleobiology,
paleoclimatology, and other scientific disciplines having to do with Deep Time; electronics,
especially computers, Internet servers, GPS navigation systems, satellites, etc.; rockets,
rocket science; the far future (Pisces and the 12 th House rules the past, both the personal past
and the various incarnations which one has undergone before this life); dark energy, dark
matter, dark flow, and other cosmological weirdnesses; meteorology; comets, meteors,
meteorites;

Poetry:
 “Concord Hymn”

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,

Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled;
Here once the embattled farmers stood;
And fired the shot heard round the world.

The foe long since in silence slept;

Alike the conqueror silent sleeps,
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream that seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream,

We place with joy a votive stone,
That memory may their deeds redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

O Thou who made those heroes dare

To die, and leave their children free, –
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raised to them and Thee.

“The New Colossus”

by Emma Lazarus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Music:

“The Star-Spangled Banner”

“La Marseillaise”

Graphic arts:

The Regionalist work of American artists Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri, Grant Wood
of Iowa, John Steuart Curry of Kansas, etc.
The work of the Social Realists. Social Realism developed as a reaction against
idealism and Romanticism as the less-pleasant consequences of the Industrial Revolution
became glaringly apparent; the Social Realists focused on the ugly realities of contemporary
life and sympathized with working-class people, particularly the poor.

Books and other literary productions:

 The works of H. P. Lovecraft, who loved antiquarian things, and wrote science fiction
about long-gone civilized species and beings from other worlds, are strongly associated with
Aquarius. Above all, the Starry Wisdom Cult that is mentioned numerous times in the
Cthulhu Mythos which he and his colleagues invented is a very Aquarian concept.
All science fiction.
All libertarian and classical liberal literature, e.g.,

Films:

All science fiction films and movies.

Saints and exemplars:

All those who have fought for freedom, such as Toussaint L’Ouverture, commander of
the successful Haitian revolution against French rule in 1791; George Washington and other
heroes of the American Revolutionary War against Great Britain, and all who signed the
Declaration of Independence from Great Britain; the men who fought and died at the Alamo
in San Antonio, Texas, in 1836, such as David Crockett, Jim Bowie, and James Travis, and
those who avenged their deaths at the Battle of San Jacinto later that same year; Mahatma
Gandhi, one of the leaders of India’s independence movement;

American emblems, sigils, symbols, folklore, and urban legend:

The iconic bald eagle (American eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus)

All emblems, sigils, icons, symbols, folklore, and urban related to the United States of
America.

Far Eastern cosmological associations:

Trigram from the I Ching:

Sun, the Gentle, Wind, Wood

________
________
___ ___

Hexagrams from the I Ching:

57. Sun / the Gentle (The Penetrating, Wind)

(King Wen arrangement)

________
________
___ ___
________
________
___ ___

above Sun The Gentle, Wind, Wood

below Sun The Gentle, Wind, Wood

THE JUDGMENT
 THE GENTLE. Success through what is small.
It furthers one to have somewhere to go.
It furthers one to see the great man.

THE IMAGE

Winds following one upon the other:

The image of THE GENTLY PENETRATING.
Thus the superior man
Spreads his commands abroad
And carries out his undertakings.

28. Ta Kuo / Preponderance of the Great

(King Wen arrangement)

___ ___
___ ___
________
________
________
________
___ ___

above Tui The Joyous, Lake

below Sun The Gentle, Wind, Wood

THE JUDGMENT

PREPONDERANCE OF THE GREAT.

The ridgepole sags to the breaking point.
It furthers one to have somewhere to go.
Success.

THE IMAGE

The lake rises above the trees:

The image of PREPONDERANCE OF THE GREAT.
Thus the superior man, when he stands alone,
Is unconcerned,
And if he has to renounce the world,
He is undaunted

Astrological associations: Wind (wood, air) is associated with the planet Jupiter. Aquarius
corresponds to the Year of the Tiger. This astrological month may also be thought of as the Month of the
Tiger. The Tiger rules that period of the night running from four to two hours before dawn. Wood (Air,
Wind) produces Fire, and is produced by Water; Metal destroys Wood, and Wood destroys Earth.

b. Design and Title of Trump

As Bill Butler says in his Dictionary of the Tarot (Schocken Books, 1973, 1977), the traditional
design of Trump XVII, The Star, is not very clear as to its meaning. It shows a kneeling woman pouring
liquid from pitchers she holds in either hand. She pours one stream onto the water, and the other onto the
nearby land. Fortunately, most of the legends and myths connected with the stars, which this card
represents, are well-known in all parts of the Earth, especially today, when the World Wide Web presents
a vast amount of information about these and everything else that nearly anyone can access at any time.
 In Symbols of Transformation, Carl Jung recalls the Mithraic saying “I am a star that goes with thee
and shines out of the depths.” Many of the meanings attributed to stars involve in some way the
phenomenon of movement: the Star of Bethlehem guiding the three Magi who came to visit the baby
Jesus and give him gifts; the order of stars and their function in both primitive and scientific timekeeping
and navigation; the forces of spirit struggling against the forces of darkness; the force of the universe
expanding, which symbolizes the mystic center of all things.
In many cultures the connection between stars and meteors (“shooting stars”) that is made is that
each man’s soul is represented by a star in the heavens (“Every man and every woman is a star.” –
Aleister Crowley). At his birth a new star comes into being, which waxes and wanes in the skies
according to his fortunes upon Earth; and at his death, his soul is seen falling as a meteor.
A similar myth comes from ancient Sparta. Every eight years the Ephors of Sparta, a group of five
magistrates who supervised the king, gathered to observe a moonlit night sky. If they saw a meteor, it was
taken as a sign that the king had done something to offend the Gods, and he was suspended from his
office until he had purged the offense at the shrine of the Oracle of Delphi or Olympus. (That custom may
have evolved from an earlier tradition of killing the king if a meteor was observed on the night of the
Eighth Year.)
Stars also represent phenomena from the Collective Unconscious: the sentinels of Heaven, angels or
devils (some believe they are the former, others, the latter), the Spirit, i.e., the Star of Hope, the Star of
Wonder, etc.

Gringonneur Tarot: Missing.

Bembo: A gowned, standing woman, her upraised left hand cupping the light of an eight-pointed star
(octogram).

Swiss: A woman kneeling on the shore of an ocean. She holds a vase in either hand, one of which
she is emptying into the water. There are seven stars, each with six points (i.e., hexagrams, Stars
of David).

Insight: A woman kneeling on land, a vase in either hand, emptying the contents of both out onto the
land. There are eight stars above her, each with five points (pentagrams).

Marseille: A woman kneeling on the shore. She is pouring one vase full of liquid into the water, the
other onto the land. Above her are two small stars seven points each (septagrams), five small
stars with eight points each, and one large star with fifteen points.

Italian: Similar to the design of the Marseille version of this card, but the liquids in the vases are of
different colors.

Wirth: Similar to the design of the Italian and Marseille versions of the cards, but the bird that is
present in both of those designs is here replaced by a butterfly.

Waite: His design is similar to the traditional designs, except that his design has eight stars, each
having eight points; seven of the stars are white, while the eighth, central star is yellow.

B.O.T.A.: Similar to the above.

Aquarian: This version of the card shows a peacock perching on a bush in flower, and it has a 10-
pointed star.

Crowley: Crowley’s version of the card shows a naked Titaness – Crowley says that she is the
Egyptian Goddess Nuit – in an icy landscape. From the golden chalice held in her right hand she
pours liquid out onto the globe, and from the silver one in her left (which has green highlights in
the finished version), she pours ice out onto the junction of the frozen, barren, empty wilderness
all around her and into the Great Sea of Binah. The icy landscape shown here is appropriate
because of the sort of weather that is frequently experienced in the Northern Hemisphere when
the Sun is in Aquarius. The climate shown in this card is obviously Arctic, yet there are roses in
the right-hand corner of the picture.
New: An aged, enhaloed face accompanied by an eight-pointed star looks down on a walled city.
Light streams from his eyes. On the right, a chalice empties itself onto a rainbow. On the left, a
cock crows.

America’s Tarot: Follows Crowley’s system, hence is numbered IV and has the title The Emperor.
Elvis Presley; Ned Buntline; a montage of famous American handguns; Article IV of the Bill of
Rights.
Alternative, in accord with the original system, in which this card is numbered XVII and has
the title The Star, shows the Saturn V that carried Apollo XI to the Moon on the launch pad at
Cape Canaveral, the Apollo capsule as its payload. It is night; bright spotlights play around the
rocket, and men, looking tiny next to the rocket’s enormous bulk, scurry around, doing last-
minute checks and maintenance. The Moon is not in the sky (Apollo XI launched at 9:32 a.m.
on the morning of July 16, 1969; and as the Moon was then less than 30 degrees east of the Sun,
it would not even have risen during the night, nor would it have been easily visible during the
day), but a myriad stars are; the band of the Milky Way runs across the sky (astronomically
incorrect if we are looking at the rocket from the east or west, but hey, this is what they call
artistic license1!).

The Divine Comedy Tarot

:
The Inferno, Canto XV:43-78 Brunetto’s prophecy:

And he to me: “If you follow your star, you cannot fail to reach a glorious harbor: if
I judged clearly in the sweet life. If I had not died before you, I would have supported
you in your work, seeing that Heaven is so kind to you. But that ungrateful, malignant
people, who came down from Fiesole to Florence, in ancient times, and still have
something of the mountain and the rock, will be inimical to you for the good you do, and
with reason, since it is not fitting for the sweet fig tree to fruit, among the sour crab-
apples.
“Past report on earth declares them blind, an envious, proud and avaricious people:
make sure you purge yourself of their faults. Your fate prophesies such honor for you,
that both parties will hunger for you, but the goat will be far from the grass. Let the herd
from Fiesole make manure of themselves, but not touch the plant in which the sacred
seed of those Romans revives, who stayed, when that nest of malice was created, if any
plant still springs from their ordure.”

Purgatorio, Canto XXVII:

A little glimpse of sky was seen above;

Yet by that little I beheld the stars
In magnitude and rustle shining forth
With more than wonted glory.

Paradiso: Canto XXII-XXVI: the Sphere of the Fixed Stars

Biblical Tarot: The scene in the Book of Job, Chapter 38 in which God intimidates Job by
questioning him about his knowledge of the Mazzaroth (the Zodiac) and other celestial prodigies,
and the other wonders God had made.

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Moxie, in a “Mafiosa X” coverall, puts a finger to her lips, embarrassed but
still grinning, as she pours toxic waste from two barrels into a pristine river. Eight stars look
down, disgusted.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot: Members of the Starry Wisdom Cult, gathered on a hilltop, looking up at
the clear, star-filled night sky as Nyarlathotep, to the viewer’s left, points out notable stars and
 discusses them with his flock. Nyarlathotep is done entirely in shades of pitch-black and
charcoal gray, and stands out against the night sky because of the bright stars in it.

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

c. Divinatory Meanings
Case: Tzaddi (“Fish-Hook”), that which drags the Fish (Nun, Death) up out of the water (Mem,
Trump XII, The Hanged Man). A quest for realization. Meditation. Aquarius, ruled by Saturn
and Uranus. The color violet. The musical note A sharp or B flat. Natural Intelligence.

Christian: The Star of the Magi. Hope. Immortality. The Inner Light that illuminates the Spirit.

Crowley: Crowley gives two Hebraic attributions for this card. In Liber 777, like Mathers, Waite,
and Case, he gives Tzaddi and Key 28; and in The Book of Thoth and The Book of the Law, he
gives Heh (‫ )ה‬and Key 15. His correspondences from Liber 777 include: Aquarius; Air; Saturn
and Mercury, ruling Air; the Natural Intelligence; the star; the color violet; Nuit, Athena,
Ganymede, and Juno; the Man and the Eagle; the olive, the coconut, artificial glass; the Censer
as the Magickal Weapon; galbanum as the perfume; diuretics as drugs; astrology as the
Magickal Power; the geomantic sign Tristitia; Daughter of the Firmament, the Dweller Between
the Waters as the titles; hope, unexpected help, clarity of vision, realization of possibilities,
spiritual insight, error of judgment, dreaminess, disappointment.

Douglas: Hope, potential fulfillment, possibilities in the future. Restriction, rigidity of mind or soul,
self-doubt.

Gray: Traditional meanings, plus the additional suggestion of giving spiritual gifts or great love.
Pessimism or doubt, illness of the mind or body.

Golden Dawn: The Victory of Fundamental Strength. Venus acting through Aquarius on Luna.
Hope. Daughter of the Firmament. Dweller Between the Waters. Faith, unexpected help,
dreaminess, deceived hope.

Grimaud: Harmony, based on the psychic and spiritual in all its forms. Satisfaction, love of
humanity in all its beauty. The destiny of the feelings which animate the being. A powerful
card, but one which is easily neutralized. Harmony broken in the destiny of the seeker. Physical
harmony of short duration.

Huson: Traditional.

Kaplan: Traditional.

Knight: Heh (‫)ה‬, “Window.” Aries the Ram. Most authorities read this card as either Tzaddi or Peh.
Only Crowley, in some of his writings, and Gareth Knight give Heh as the correlate of this card.

Lind: Hope.

Mathers: Hope, expectation, bright promises. Unfulfilled hope, disappointed expectations, or hopes
fulfilled only to a minor degree.

Mayananda: The supernal power as divine fire or life. Ambrosia, the Food of the Gods. “One of the
chief difficulties of the Taro.”

Papus: Peh (‫)פ‬, speech, Mercury. Immortality, hope, the Force which dispenses the Essence of Life.
 Sadhu: Peh (‫)פ‬, a throat with a tongue. Mercury. Hope, intuition, natural divination.

Thierens: Venus, ruler of the signs Taurus and Libra. Benefit, well doing, organization, cooperation,
love, beauty, peace, etc. Laziness, indolence, rest, weakness.

Ussher: Traditional.

Waite: Hope, immortality, and inner light. Truth unveiled, pouring onto the waters of the soul some
part and measure of her priceless possession. The Great Mother communicating to those below
in the measure they are capable of receiving and understanding. Badly aspected, the card can
mean loss, theft, privation, abandonment, arrogance, haughtiness, or impotence, but some
interpretations give hope and bright prospects.

Butler: A window through which the Querent can see himself. A card of potential, whether positive
or negative depending on the cards which lie near it. The soul meaning of Star may, after all, be
the closest to what it is.

America’s Tarot: The Dance of Time. The Star of Hope. Reach for the stars – ad astra!

The Divine Comedy Tarot: Adhere to your faith, and do not abandon your true path in life. Follow
your star.

Biblical Tarot: Truth lies Creation, which bears the signature of God.

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Life is a river – and it’s polluted. Truth is immutable, but it sure can be
covered up if you have enough junk to do it with.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot: You may receive an invitation to join the Starry Wisdom Cult today:
Uncle Nyarlathotep wants you! The science of the Elder Things. The Will of the Elder Gods.

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

Suggested meanings:

Upright: Liberation, freedom, liberty, the Goddess Liberty. Homosexuality as a

preference, not a perversion. Aquarius-ruled cities, e.g., New York City.* Altruism,
humanitarian actions and impulses. Democracy, Socialism, Communism, mass movements.
Protests, polls. The US Senate (and, in some interpretations, the Lower House of the US
Congress). Selfless love, disinterested love. Modern objective science, especially the hard
sciences. The social sciences. Agape, perfected love. Love of God by man, love of man by
God. Friendship. Colleagues and associates. Fraternal organizations, Magickal orders and
lodges. Social experiments of any kind. The unusual, different, deviant, odd,
nonconformist, unexpected, etc. Mutations, in either a scientific or alchemical sense.
Reversed: Libertinism, license (to indulge all whims), whim, a way of life dedicated to
perversion of all good things, especially sex. Deviation from the normal or healthy.
Oppression, tyranny, dictatorships. The drive to acquire and maintain one’s security and
power by controlling and oppressing others.

*NYC is also ruled by Gemini. New York City has been the gateway to America for a great majority of
immigrants since the late 19 th century, and for many has come to symbolize the United States of
America, whose natal chart has Gemini rising, Uranus in Gemini rising and conjunct the Ascendant,
and Aquarius, ruled by Uranus, on the Midheaven (natal data: July 4, 1776 e.v., 2:15 a.m. [as
translated from local to Eastern Stand Time], Independence Hall, Philadelphia, PA [75° 9’ West
longitude, 39° 57’ North latitude]. With both Gemini and Aquarius so strong in that chart,
America’s showcase city, New York City, clearly exhibits archetypal traits of and is ruled by those
two Signs.

d. Interrelationships of the Path and the Trump

 19. Key 29
Qoph q, “The Back of the Head” (referring to the cerebellum, ruled by this Path). Trump XVIII,
The Moon. Pisces ý. Cardinal value, 100; ordinal value, 19. Connects Sephirah 7, Netzach, with
Sephirah 10, Malkuth. Roman/English equivalent: A guttural sound represented by the Roman “Q,”
closer to the “Ch” of Cheth, like the Scots “loch” or German “Achtung!” than to the Roman “k,” but not
the “kw” sound of “Qu” as used in written English.

a. Qaballistic Meanings and Theory

Qoph is concerned with the body as the vehicle of the Spirit, and with the basic instincts, especially
sexual reproduction, which can lead to the reproduction of more physical bodies. It is therefore a Path in
which the intellect plays little part, and those who operate more or less exclusively in the sphere of the
mind, or don’t like considering the facts of physical life and the chemical and biological factors of their
own being in Earth, may find it repellant. .The biological and physical roots of our lives is one of the
things which one faces on the 29th Path.
But this doesn’t mean though that we are entirely conditioned by our biology and the physicality of
our being, or only a mere product of them. The spirit and individuality are capable of controlling the
Personality in spite of our reflexes and instincts. We are necessarily rooted in instinct and in the
protoplasmic makeup of our bodies, but this doesn’t mean that we aren’t responsible for our actions. 40
The Tarot card assigned to this Path is Trump XVIII, The Moon. The title of the Path is Ruler of
Flux and Reflux, Child of the Sons of the Mighty. The traditional design shows a crayfish or lobster
emerging from a stream or pond onto a path leading between two towers into a wild range of hills lit by
the light of the Full Moon. On either side of the path are a dog and a wolf, and drops of blood fall from
the Moon.
The card is a composite symbol of the processes of physical evolution, the primitive amphibious form
emerging from brackish water onto land and essaying a long journey of evolution. The towers represent
the opposite poles of manifestation, and the dog and the wolf show the wild and domesticated versions of
a single species. The dog is an animal sacred to Hekate, Goddess of the Moon, and the primitive sexual
side of the card is apparent considering that to the Greeks, the sound of a dog howling at the Moon was
the apotheosis of sexuality. The blood dripping from the Moon is a reminder of “Nature red in tooth and
claw aspect of nature.” 40 In some designs of this card, the drops of blood have the form of Yods, 41
signifying spermatozoa. The Moon is associated with the great cyclic movements of tides, and also with
the growth of vegetation and the menstrual cycle of woman [see endnote 40]. This cyclic activity no doubt
accounts for the title of the Trump, Ruler of Flux and Reflux. The alternative title, Child of the Sons of
the Mighty, signifies the primitive Elemental aspects of the path, the Elemental Kingdoms being
‘creations of the created,’ that is, creations of the Sons of God rather than of the Mighty Logos Itself.
The name of the Key to the Path, the Hebrew letter Qoph, is “the Back of the Head.” This attribution
is strongly suggested by the shape of the letter, which is like the hind part of the skull with the top of the
spinal column attached. The spinal cord is the center of numerous automatic responses and reflexes. The
hindbrain contains the medulla oblongata, through which pass nerve fiber tracts uniting the spinal cord
and brain; it also includes the cerebellum, which receives impulses from muscles, tendons and joints via
the spinal tracts, and thereby regulates one’s posture. 42 The intimate connection of the back of the head
with the physical coordination of the body echoes the description of the Path in the Yetziratic Text: the
Corporeal Intelligence.
The astrological significance of this Path is Pisces, the Fish. In the heavens the two fish are spaced
quite widely apart and joined by a long ribbon or string, a sort of umbilical cord. At one level of
interpretation this could be taken to be the Individuality and personality linked together in the world of
form. Early on, individuality is held captive in form by the personality, but as one’s evolution progresses
the situation is reversed, so that the personality is held under the control of the individuality. This is the
long-term result of the principle of Flux and Reflux, the ebb and flow of the direction of growth of the
spirit’s vehicles into and out of form. 43
The following poem, a slightly paraphrased adaptation from Dion Fortune’s novels Moon-Magic*
and the Sea-Priestess,* gives a very good feeling for the essential meaning of this card:

I am She Who, ere the Earth was formed,

Was Rhea, Binah, Ge.
 I am that soundless, boundless, bitter Sea
Out of Whose Deeps life wells eternally.
Astarte, Aphrodite, Ashtoreth,
Giver of life and bringer-in of death;
Hera in Heaven, on Earth, Persephone;
Kali and Black Isis, dancing on Their hills of skulls,
Mikhail and Ezeli, Black Mary and Athena,
Battling demons in the sky,
Star-flecked Nuit, o’er-arching all the world,
Diana of the Ways, and Hekate:
All these am I, all are found in Me.
The hour of the high full Moon draw near;
I hear the invoking words, hear and appear:
ShaDdaI EL ChaI, Kether, and Rhea, Binah, Ge,
And ELITh, self-creating Creation
In Aspects three,
I come unto the one who calleth Me.

***

O Isis Veiled and Rhea, Binah, Ge,

Lead us to the Well of Memory,
The Well-Head where the pale white cypress grows,
By secret twilight paths that no man knows,
The shadowy path dividing into three –
Diana of the Ways, and Hekate,
Selene of the Moon, and Persephone,
Mother Mary, Lilith, and Tsou-Mou,
Kali-Shiva-Chandi-Durga, Parvati,
And the Lord of Magick, Djehuti,
Thrice-Great Hermes, Psychopompos
And Divine Hermaphrodite.
The high full Moon at the zenith shines clear!
O hear the invoking words, hear and appear!
ShaDdaI EL ChaI, Kether, and Rhea, Binah, Ge!

***

Sink down, sink down, sink deeper and sink deep,

Into eternal and primordial sleep.
Sink down, forget, be still and draw apart
Into the Inner Earth’s Most Secret Heart.
Drink of the Waters of Persephone,
The Secret Well beside the Sacred Tree.
I am that secret Queen, Persephone.
All Tides are Mine, and answer unto Me.
Tides of the Airs, Tides of the Inner Earth,
The secret, silent Tides of Death and birth:
Tides of men’s souls, and dreams, and destiny –
Isis Veiled, and Rhea, Binah, Ge –
ELITh, self-creating Creation
In Aspects three.

***

I am that Star that rises from the Twilight Sea,

Bringing men dreams that rule their destiny.
I bring the Moon-Tides to the souls of men,
 The Tides that flow and ebb and flow again,
That flow and ebb and flow alternately:
These are My Secret, these belong to Me.

***

I am eternal Woman, I am She –

The Tides of all men’s souls belong to Me.
The Tides that flow and ebb and flow again,
The secret, silent Tides that govern men:
These are My Secret, these belong to Me.

***

Out of My Hands he takes his destiny,

The touch of My Hands bestows serenity.
These are the Moon-Tides, these belong to Me.
Durga in Heaven, on Earth, Persephone,
Diana of the Ways, and Liberty,
Athena-Medusa, Aphrodite from the Sea,
All these am I, and They are found in Me.

***

The high full Moon at the zenith shines clear;

I hear thy prayer of invocation, and appear:
ShaDdaI EL ChaI, Kether, and Rhea, Binah, Ge,
I come unto those who call upon Me.

***

Sink down, sink down, sink deeper and more deep

Into eternal and primordial sleep.
Sink down, be still, forget and draw apart
Into the Inner Earth’s Most Secret Heart.
Drink of the Waters of Persephone,
The Secret Well beside the Sacred Tree.
Waters of life and strength and inner light –
Eternal joy born from the Deeps of Night.
Then rise, made strong, with life and hope renewed,
Reborn from darkness and from solitude,
Blessed with the blessing of Persephone
And secret strength of Rhea, Binah, Ge.

***

Persephone, O Moon of men’s desire,

Thy lambent light illumines with cold moon-fire!
Persephone, Persephone,
Moon of the night, we long for Thee.
In Outer Space, the Springs of Being arise;
With tidal sweep, Life streams across the skies,
And in men’s hearts awake the slumbering fires:
Thou art the Queen of Dreams and of Desires.
Persephone, Persephone,
Moon of the Night, we come to Thee!

***
 The Moon is riding high and clear,
O Lovely One, draw near, draw near;
To lonely ones on lonely ways,
Come down in dream of silver haze.
Persephone, Persephone,
All in the end shall come to Thee,
Radiant ELITh, self-creating Creation
In Aspects three.

*Dion Fortune, Moon-Magic (Weiser Books, 2003; ISBN 978-1578632893).

**Dion Fortune, The Sea Priestess (Weiser Books, 1979; ISBN 978-0877284246).

Astrologically, Luna’s diurnal esoteric dominion is over Pisces, which rules the oceans and seas of
the world. The Moon generates the great ocean tides as well as ruling the tides of Life itself and the
emotions that power those tides, the tides of sex, reproduction, death, and evolution. This Path is also
beautifully represented by the musical piece Bolero, which builds and builds on a simple theme to a
crescendo of enormous power, like the great rushing tidal-waves of emotion which build and build upon
relatively simple biochemical processes taking place within the body that impel us to waking, sleeping,
sex, rage, and all the rest of the vast spectrum of emotional and instinctual life, whether we will it or not.
Pisces and the Twelfth House of the Horoscope rule hidden things and things conducted from or in
hiding, including sabotage, espionage, covert operations, guerrilla warfare, murder, poisons, and child
abuse; anonymous contributions to charity, anonymous actions of any kind; charity; hospitals;
martyrdom; masochism; the past; past incarnations, the history and evolutionary roots of the individual
soul; the unconscious, both individual and collective; the oceans; and the evolution and extinction of
species and the development of the individual as processes. They rule the hidden highways and byways of
life, places of asylum or confinement: hospitals, ashrams, prisons, and the womb. They rule the oceans
and everything connected with them, and all the waters of the world. The oceans facilitate what might be
called the emotional life of our living world, regulating the weather and climate everywhere on Earth,
generating storms which in the short run may be extremely destruction, but are absolutely necessary in the
long run if Earth’s heat-budget and the dynamics of her atmosphere are to remain healthy.
We began in the sea. All our nature is based on it, its memory and that of the lives of our most
ancestors in every cell of our bodies. Its yawning gulfs represent our nightmares and greatest fears; its
bounty sustains our lives and gives us hope. From the writer of the book of Job to Debussy and Herman
Melville to H. P. Lovecraft and the good folks who maintain the website Bloopwatch.org, our greatest
writers and artists have always been fascinated by the sea and everything in it, using them extensively as
subjects in their works – and for good reason, as the soul of humanity has been captive by the oceans since
time out of mind. More: every atom of hydrogen in our bodies has been part of one sea or another since
the very first oceans began to form on Earth, as the world’s first liquid water fell from the anoxic but
water-rich skies, creating first puddles and rills, then ponds and streams, then lakes and rivers, and,
finally, seas and oceans among the bare, still-cooling rocks that formed Earth’s nascent surface more than
four billion years ago.
Yet most of the oceans are unknown to us. We reflexively equate them with the Collective
Unconscious, appropriately so, as Poseidon’s dominion is as much over the water in our bodies, of which
we are rarely if ever aware, as it is of water at large. The great sharks and huge whales and unknown
megacephalopoda and vast, unknown Lovecraftian marvels and the East Pacific Gyre and all the oil slicks
that BP ever let loose that lurk in the watery deeps all have their counterparts in the depths of our
unconscious minds, the ones that occasionally show themselves in the depths of night, around 3 a.m.,
when all the tides of the world are at their ebb our worst lucid nightmares burst forth to prey on our
quaking sanity.
 Qaballistic correspondences:

Yetziratic text: The Twenty-ninth Path is the Corporeal Intelligence, so called because it forms
every body which is formed in all the worlds, and the reproduction of them.”

Yetziratic title: Ruler of Flux and Reflux. Child of the Sons of the Mighty.

Hebrew letter: q (Qoph)

Numerical value: 100

Astrological assignment: Pisces, ruler of the 12 th House of the horoscope, ruled by Jupiter and
Neptune; in which Venus is exalted; and of which the Sun and Moon are the esoteric
rulers. Pisces is a Mutable Water sign. The 12 th House is a Succeedent House of Endings.

Ecological process, realm, or principle: The formation of large bodies of water, i.e., great lakes,
seas, and oceans; and the Hypersea.* In terms of body ecology, Qoph is represented by the
fluids in and between every cell of every multicellular organism, and by those in the cells of
bacteria and extremophiles. Also, Qoph is associated with the endocrinological systems of
complex animal life, including Homo sapiens (Venus, the lower octave of Neptune, ruler of
Pisces, which is associated with Qoph, is exalted in Pisces, and is one of the astrological
rulers of the some of the endocrine glands, while Neptune rules the endocrinological system
overall.) Those parts of the vertebrate brain associated with sleep and dreaming, which are
ruled by Neptune, are under the dominion of Pisces, as well.

*The Hypersea is a concept first developed by biologists Mark and Dianna McMenamin.

Life on land is such a spectacular success because, say Dianna and Mark McMenamin, 450
million years ago life created the Hypersea – a vast new ocean of interconnected tissues whose ways
were chartered by pioneering fungi and parasites.
Life started in the ocean about 4 billion years ago, and for 3.5 billion years, it remained there.
Evolution created organisms that had to stay wet – they were essentially fluid-filled bags, and if they
dried out, their circulatory systems would collapse, and most of their proteins and DNA would
crumple up into uselessness. Without the ocean’s nutrient-filled currents, they would starve, and they
and their fragile eggs and larvae would be immobile, unable to reach new or better habitats.
Seen from the sea, then, the land should equal death. Yet since animals, plants, and fungi first
came ashore some 450 million years ago, life on land has been outrageously successful. To be sure,
land organisms have had to remain fluid-filled, DNA-based sacs, and they still rely on the old-
fashioned, oceanic ways of getting food and energy, such as predation and photosynthesis. But there
are now twice as many species on land as there are in the seas, and they produce some 50 times as
much biomass. Furthermore, they manage this on only one-third the ocean’s breadth and in only a
tiny fraction of its depth. And they achieved these luxuriant statistics in very little time. If oceanic life
were a hundred-year-old man, life on land would be an eleven-year-old child.
Other researchers have tried to explain this land-sea paradox without much success. But Mark
and Dianna McMenamin, a husband- and-wife paleontological team, have a new hypothesis that they
believe can explain it all, at one go. To understand the success of life on land, they say, you have to
recognize that it is a unified whole. What makes it different from marine life is that unrelated
terrestrial organisms – plants, fungi, and animals – form a vast number of direct, physical
connections through which fluid can move. In effect, the McMenamins claim, life on land has not so
much forsaken the sea as created a new sea within the sum of its tissue – something Dianna and Mark
have dubbed Hypersea.
“Hypersea is in many ways different from an ocean: for starters, it has no surface on which you
can gaze, and it does not seek to be level. If you could look at life on land through a machine that
registered only fluid, you would see great columns of nutrient-laced water rising – the columns would
be where trees stand. You would see water flowing horizontally underground among plant roots and
fungi, pouring into animals as they fed, moving as the creatures moved. According to the
McMenamins, this liquid matrix has become Earth’s newest aquatic habitat, one that marine
organisms have aggressively colonized. And in critical ways it behaves exactly like an ocean: the
movement of fluid through Hypersea provides life with the same sustenance that ocean currents do.
But there is one notable difference in the life it feeds: rather than being passive beneficiaries of an
ocean that surrounds them, land organisms can control the currents within them. Thus, viewed as
Hypersea, life on land couldn’t help being a smashing success.
The McMenamins propose Hypersea not as metaphor but as reality. If they are right, and
Hypersea does actually ripple through all the plants on the surface of Earth, all the insects, the birds,
the reptiles, the mammals, all the cells in all the bodies that crawl or walk upon the land, the
implications are as vast as the sea itself. Hypersea not only offers, for example, an explanation for the
largely mysterious emergence of life on land but it also suggests a number of bizarre life-forms that
should once have existed and perhaps still do. It explains not only the land’s greater biomass and
biodiversity but also such mysteries as why terrestrial food chains are so much shorter than marine
ones. It could provide agricultural and medical researchers with new ways to understand pests and
diseases. It could even reveal the future of evolution.”
The first glimmerings of the concept of the Hypersea came about when Dianna McMenamin was
an undergraduate at the University of California at Santa Barbara, coinciding with her interest in and
study of the kingdom of the fungi. There are several hundred thousand species of fungus, which are
more closely related to animals than are plants. Without a fungus, bread would be matzo and beer
would be barley juice. Without penicillin and other antibiotics produced by fungi, infections would
have claimed millions more lives this century. Without fungi in the soil, most plants would die,
because they are joined with fungi in life-giving symbiosis.
Fungi exist as a web of slender threads known as hyphae, many of which are only one cell thick.
They have no mouths with which they can eat like animals, and they can’t photosynthesize like
plants. What they have are enzymes that can break down living tissue, dead organic matter, or even
rock; fungi get their nourishment by releasing these enzymes and then soaking up the resultant slush
through their cell walls. The hyphae of many species, known collectively as mycorrhizal fungi, invade
the roots of plants and sometimes even their stems and plunge into their cells. Though the fungi seem
poised then to suck the plants dry, they are in fact good, considerate neighbors. Mycorrhizal fungi
take some of the plants’ carbohydrates, but in return they give minerals and other compounds – a
more intelligent relationship than is often found between human neighbors.
Fungi form underground networks that unite forests of different plant species. Sometimes a
network acts like a nervous system. When a plant is attacked by insects, some species of fungus can
pump pesticides into it. If one part of a stand of trees is poor in nitrogen and another is short of water,
fungi can transport the substances needed. And if the plants are starving, fungi can give them lumps
of oil to feed on.
One of Dianna’s interests as an undergraduate was the bizarre sex life of fungi. In many species
of fungi, when two hyphae from different fungi meet, they probe each other. If they are of different
sexes – a matter of genetic, rather than genital, compatibility – they fuse and exchange genes. (The
species that Dianna studied has 5,000 different sexes.) After mating, fungi often produce
aboveground structures such as mushrooms and toadstools, loaded with up to a trillion spores.
By the time she was ready for graduate school, Dianna’s interests had focused on questions
relating to the origin of life, and she decided to study paleontology at Santa Barbara. But she soon
found that when she would ask other paleontologists about the origin of fungi, they’d simply shrug.
With few known fossils, fungal origins were a blank. In 1980, Dianna met Mark, when he too came
to study paleontology at Santa Barbara. They soon married.
Mark’s own career had grown out of a boyhood fascination with early life-forms. When he was
ten, he paged through a book of fossils and was struck by a picture of an inch-wide disk with three
curved rays radiating from its center. The book explained that this creature, a tribrachidium, was 550
million years old, and that no one had any idea what it was. I thought, this is very strange, Mark
recalls. The tribrachidium was among Earth’s first multicellular animals, known collectively as the
Ediacaran fauna (named after Ediacara, Australia, where the first fossils were found). These animals
were flat, boneless, eyeless, mouthless, and brainless. About 530 million years ago they vanished
during a burst of evolution known as the Cambrian explosion, which populated the oceans with
almost all the major forms of life that have existed ever since. The whole focus of my graduate work
was trying to locate these things, to try to find a new field site, says Mark. He traveled the length of
North America searching for one. Eventually he found a rich vein of Ediacaran fossils in Mexico. The
site has yielded dozens of new species, and Mark has become an authority on the first chapter of the
story of animals. This past March he discovered a jellyfish-like animal at the site that is 590 million
years old – the oldest known fossil of a multicellular animal.
Like other Ediacaran fossils, it is a humble blob. In their book The Emergence of Animals, the
McMenamins hypothesized that these creatures lived in a world very different from ours, one that had
ample room for humble blobs. They created their own food, so even though they were large, they were
not predators, nor were they preyed on, says Mark. Some animals harbored photosynthesizing
microbes in their tissues, while others harvested the energy in chemical compounds in the ocean.
Some were just passive nutrient absorbers, picking up amino acids kicking around in the water. Mark
likes to call this tranquil world the Garden of Ediacara.
For reasons that are still unclear, the Cambrian explosion brought the world’s first predators,
complete with mouths and brains, and they swiftly destroyed the Ediacaran garden. But as Mark
points out, there was an evolutionary upside: When you get those first predators, they force their prey
to do new things. Your lineage gets helped by the things that are trying to eat you. Help, in this
instance, means you develop armors and poisons and escape maneuvers. And then the predators
undergo a diversification and you get an upward spiral, and in a few million years, boom, you fill the
ocean with countless of new species.
In 1984 the McMenamins went to Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, where Mark had
taken a teaching position. As they worked on their book on animals, Mark started overhauling his
class on the history of life. “When I looked at the textbook I was using, there seemed to be something
missing,” he says. “For one thing, fungi were barely discussed. For another,” he says, “plants were
mentioned, but peripherally, in little boxes. This seemed like a serious oversight. The one thing I kept
coming back to was coal.” In their study of early life, the McMenamins had noticed an odd
coincidence. During the Cambrian explosion, dry land was occupied by only a varnish of bacteria.
But within 60 million years, plants and animals arrived, and less than 100 million years after that,
life on land was already more diverse than in the oceans. Land plants were forming forests so vast
that they created a kind of rock never seen before: coal. For billions of years there’s no coal, says
Mark, and then suddenly there’s a new rock. No one had been able to solve the mystery of how a
biological process so powerful that it became a geologic force could burst on the scene so quickly.
Mark became fascinated with this second explosion of Phanerozoic life. He and Dianna spent a
great deal of time discussing this after he started doing his research, Mark tossing out explanations
for it, Dianna shooting them down. In particular, she reminded him that any theory for the rise of life
on land had to explain the mysterious origin of fungi. I kept hammering on him, saying, ‘Look at the
fungi!’
Mark turned to a weighty fungus textbook for inspiration. “I’m reading, and I think, I’m not
going to read this whole thing. In all the articles, the interesting things are either in the throwaway
comments at the end or in footnotes. So I open up the book to one of the later chapters, and there’s a
discussion of weird cases. I’m reading along, and one weird case is this fungus called Septobasidium.
And suddenly it just hits me: this is the essence of why life works on land.”
Septobasidium is a fungus with a taste for animals – specifically, for waxy, moth-like creatures
known as scale insects that live as seemingly immobile bumps on the branches of trees. The fungus
forms a blanket that traps the insect against a trunk. Then it inserts its hyphae into the insect and
absorbs its fluids. But the paralyzed insect doesn’t die – it actually lives longer and has more young
than its uninfected counterparts. It survives by sticking a long feeding tube into the tree and sucking
out the tree’s fluids. In the meantime, the tree is drinking from a mycorrhizal fungus entwined with
its roots underground. I.e., fluid is flowing from the fungus into the plant, from plant into animal, and
from animal into fungus. Mark began to think of the other organisms connected to this association:
the parasitic fungi that infected the mycorrhizal fungus, and the wormlike nematodes that latched
onto the roots of the tree.
He realized that Septobasidium, the tree, and all the other organisms fed on currents of fluid, just
as many marine organisms do – but this fluid flowed through their own tissues. The various
organisms had, in effect, created an ocean inside themselves. The more Mark and Dianna talked
about this concept, the more it seemed to them that the whole effort of evolution on land had been to
re-create the ocean internally and exploit it. Perhaps it started as an act of evolutionary desperation,
but it was eventually able to create the staggering bulk and diversity of life that has lived on land ever
since.
Comfortable as life might be in the ocean, it has its intrinsic limits. As Mark says, the organisms
that live in the marine surface waters are in a perpetual state of famine. They strip the surface water
of its nutrients, scrubbing everything clean, and it takes a long time to replenish them. With few
exceptions, plankton can do nothing but wait for an upwelling of deep water to bring in more
nutrients. In the ocean, productivity is just little twinkles where you get upwelling, and at the fringes
along continents. The rest is just desert.
According to the McMenamins, the short pause between the Cambrian explosion and the advent
of plants, animals, and fungi on land was probably no coincidence. With brain-driven predators
ruining the neighborhood, the only safe place left was a marginal one where the animals hadn’t yet
become serious predators. Perhaps some protoplants and protofungi tried to scrape by along the
shores, where they had to endure dry periods. The protofungi would attack the protoplants and
usually kill them. But suppose a defective protofungus failed to kill its victim – it could stumble into a
symbiotic relationship with the plant that allowed them both to thrive. As the protofungus broke up
rock and consumed it, it supplied some to the protoplant. The protoplant, in turn, could stop
depending on ocean currents for its nutrients and start evolving the structure and shielding to grow
upright into the air. Once a plant could escape the water, it could immediately gather far more solar
energy. Drying out from evaporation was a risk, but evaporation was also beneficial because it acted
like a pump, pulling more water from the plant’s roots, laced with the food provided by the fungus, to
its photosynthetic tissues.
The McMenamins point out that what happens in this scenario is that suddenly the upwelling of
the ocean that brings nutrients to the surface happens inside two kinds of cooperating organisms.
Organisms have seized control of the nutrient flow. Instead of marine upwelling, land life can harness
hypermarine upwelling. No longer do the organisms have to suffer in passive starvation.
If the McMenamins are right, this fortunate arrangement should be preserved in the fossil record.
Fungus fossils are rare. But they are not nonexistent, and Mark may have found some. Along with
other researchers, he has been studying rocks from a 400-million-year-old pond in Scotland, and he
has found spores in them that look exactly like those of modern mycorrhizal species. Winfried Remy
of Westphalian Wilhelms University in Germany reported discovering in the rocks the unique bush-
shaped tendrils that mycorrhizal fungi insert into plant cells. Without that, vascular plants were
probably doing well on their own, and fungi came along as opportunists. But the fungi seem to have
been there from the beginning.
Ever since its creation of Hypersea, life on land has become increasingly successful whenever it
has figured out a new way to exploit or control the new medium. Early plants, for example, still
needed to let their gametes swim to each other in standing water. But within 50 million years they
had figured out how to run this step of reproduction in their watery interiors. Only then did plants
really start to race across the surface of the land, changing the face of the planet forever.
As this new fluid habitat of plants, fungi, and animals expanded across the land, it became an
inviting frontier for exploration. Many marine species moved onto shore not by sprouting legs but by
slipping into the blood or sap of land organisms. (Some, such as the wormlike pentastomes, have
since become extinct in the oceans.) Land parasites follow the same rules in a body as fish do in the
ocean. They navigate with sensors, detecting chemical gradients instead of light or odors. They
camouflage themselves from their predators – particularly immune cells – with biochemical rather
than visual cloaks. Like fish, parasites can be territorial. In some parasitic wasp species, the mother
will lay several eggs in a host. All but one hatch early and cruise the host’s body, killing competing
parasites so that the last larva to hatch has a habitat all to itself. As any aquarium owner knows, there
is a limit to how many fish you can put in one tank; the same crowding effect takes place among
parasites in a host. It’s like a living fishbowl, says Dianna.
The similarity of the ecological niche of land-based parasites to that of ocean fish would seem to
stop at migration, since terrestrial parasites face an obvious problem: in many places their sea is
disconnected. But, like plants and fungi, parasites can take control of the Hypersea’s flow, directing
it to get them from one host to the next. A dramatic example is offered by the worm Leucochloridium
paradoxum. It matures inside snails, but to reproduce it needs to get inside a bird. Navigating its way
through the Hypersea, the worm moves into the snail’s eyestalks. Its presence there turns the eyes a
bright red. Partially blinded, the snail crawls to the top of a plant in search of light. There the snail,
with bright eyes in plain view, is easy prey for birds. (For more on parasites and their relationships
with their hosts, see, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasitism,
http://www.damninteresting.com/parasites-on-the-brain, etc.)
The evolution of parasites in Hypersea helps explain the diversity of life on land. Once ashore,
parasites were forced to begin aggressively exploring the many environments available to them inside
land life – indeed, the difficulties of living outside a watery host left them little choice. Each potential
host, of course, was a unique environment requiring special adaptations, a situation that encouraged
the parasites to diversify, and they did so with enthusiasm. They even turned other parasites into their
homes. Like a set of Russian dolls, a host caterpillar may contain a parasitic wasp larva, which in
turn contains another larva, which is home to yet another larva, and so on, so that the caterpillar
carries five parasites in total. The effect of such specialization is made clear by the fact that, by at
least one estimate, parasitic wasps and their parasites constitute 8 percent of the world’s biodiversity
– equal to one-quarter of all the diversity in the oceans.
The diversity of life on land is also elevated as a result of the dense traffic of organisms and
genetic material riding the currents of the Hypersea through various organisms. Mark’s favorite
example is the chestnut tree. An Asian fungus has wiped out almost all chestnuts in the United States,
leaving only their root systems. But a new strain of fungus has arrived. It carries an impaired virus
that can live only in the fluid tissues of the fungus and renders the fungus harmless to chestnuts.
When the new fungus meets the old and the two engage in some fungal sex, the virus slips into the
harmful fungus and neutralizes it. Now, notes Mark, some foresters are claiming that the trees are
recovering. The result is that the fungi act like a diversity pump. Instead of a tree getting wiped out by
a parasite, with a net diversity of zero, the tree is still living, there are two strains of the fungus, and
there is the virus.
Not only viruses but bare-nekkid DNA probably gets traded frequently through the flow of
Hypersea. “The promiscuity of DNA in Hypersea has got to be tremendous,” says Mark. He cites
recent work demonstrating that the fungi and algae that together form lichen appear to have traded an
extraordinary number of genes – to a degree never seen in marine life. There are a few examples of
this in the ocean, Mark concedes, but they’re minor and puritanical.
The last time someone with scientific credibility claimed that life was united in some grand
superentity was in the 1970s, when organic chemist James Lovelock and molecular biologist Lynn
Margulis suggested that the entire biosphere stabilized the composition and temperature of the
atmosphere and oceans. They named the system Gaia. But while it is very poetic, the Gaia hypothesis
doesn’t offer scientists a straightforward way to test it, something which has led many critics to call it
unscientific. The McMenamins both admire Gaia, but they don’t think Hypersea will suffer its fate.
As Dianna says, Hypersea makes specific predictions that can be refuted, and Gaia in many ways is
simply a metaphor.
The McMenamins say that the idea of the Hypersea will rise or fall with future research into
marine parasites, which have yet to be thoroughly studied. They predict that there should be far fewer
nested parasites in the ocean, that they shouldn’t compete much with one another within a host, and
that they should survive better than terrestrial parasites outside host organisms. “We also predict that
the variance of virulence is bigger on land than in the ocean – more really bad parasites and others
that are asymptomatic,” says Mark. “In marine habitats you’d expect a narrower spectrum of
virulence, since the oceans are bathed in one medium. A virus can float all the way around the
world.”
Fungi also remain poorly understood, and these too can help test Hypersea. Since hypermarine
upwelling is a key to success in Hypersea, the most successful plants should be the ones that can
associate with the most species of fungus. This would allow them to hook into Hypersea again easily
when they attempt to colonize new ranges. (The widespread Douglas fir, for example, can associate
with 2,000 types of fungus.)
Yet another test would be to look for organisms that exploit Hypersea in ways allowed by the
hypothesis but that are thus far unidentified. For example, just as marine animals have become
terrestrial parasites, photosynthesizing algae or bacteria should also find an animal to be a fine
aquatic habitat. Mark suggests that there are (or once were) terrestrial counterparts of the Ediacaran
fauna, animals that survive by hosting photosynthesis. Whenever I give a lecture on Hypersea, says
Mark, someone comes up to me and says, ‘I think there’s one out there, too, and I’m going to find it.’
Mark himself will hunt for fossils of such life- forms. I want to go into the Appalachian Mountains
and look for evidence of unusual hypermarine linkages in these kinds of organisms. Maybe my
photosynthetic land animal is there.
What if all the tests bear out the hypothesis? For one thing, we’ll have to realize that humanity is
stirring it up as never before. Just as humans have brought zebra mussels from Europe to the waters
of the United States, we have probably brought diseases like AIDS very quickly from one reservoir of
Hypersea (monkeys) to another (ourselves) – and in both cases, the invaders are wreaking havoc. We
would benefit from manipulating Hypersea’s currents wisely. Some of the McMenamins’ biggest fans
are experts in biological pesticide management, who kill pests with parasites. The McMenamins
 suggest that by thinking of hosts as connected aquatic environments, new cures for the diseases
afflicting crops and humans could be found. By fashioning a fake NO VACANCY sign, for example,
we could trick a parasite into thinking that an uninfected host was too crowded.
The Hypersea may even offer hints as to where life on land is going. The Hypersea is not like
Gaia, a global union of life that keeps the world in a careful balance. Hypersea is life out of control, a
rising tide building up biomass and speeding up evolution.
A corollary of the McMenamins’ hypothesis is that Hypersea suggests a way to predict the future
of evolution. As an example, Mark cites mangroves, coastal plants which send some of their roots
down into soil, where they join with fungi and send other roots tens of yards into the ocean, where
they trap sediment and create new soil. There are marine organisms beginning to associate with these
roots. There are sponges associated with them, and there are tests going on right now to find if
there’s a nitrogen-hydrocarbon exchange between the sponges and the roots.
Mangroves might move out to sea and form giant floating islands. Their roots, dangling down
below the starved surface waters to the nutrient-rich darkness, could join with sponges and other
ocean organisms acting like fungi. The biological potential of this arrangement could be tremendous.
Mark says, “If it gets big enough, you’ve got incredible pipelines. That’s going to have an immediate
effect on carbon dioxide. As carbon dioxide levels fell, oxygen levels would rise, until they reached a
point at which any terrestrial life other than mangroves might be endangered. At 35 percent
atmospheric oxygen,” Mark speculates, “you could go out with a baseball bat and hit a maple tree and
it would burst into flames.”
Life wouldn’t come to an end, of course. There would still be the soggy mangroves and other
marine vegetation to serve as Hypersea’s inheritors. In its fullest flowering, life would merely have
gone back out to sea.
For more, see “Hypersea Invasion,” in Discover Magazine (October 1995;
http://discovermagazine.com/1995/oct/hyperseainvasion571)

Physical chemistry: Water as the chemical H2O.* Ionic bonds that hold molecules of mineral
salts of the sort found in sea water together.

*Water – H2O – has a number of strange properties that make it ideal as a solvent for the material in the
cells of living organisms.
Among other things, rather than being a loose, random collection of individual H 2O molecules,
water in any quantity – a drop of water, a glass of water, a lake, an ocean, water vapor high in the
atmosphere – forms an intricate network of such molecules all loosely linked together by
electromagnetism. A molecule of water, rather than looking like this:

H–O–H

looks something like this:

In a molecule of water, the two atoms of hydrogen are covalently bonded to the oxygen atom. The
water molecule is not linear, but rather has the bonds between oxygen and hydrogen atoms canted out
to the side, and the oxygen atom has a higher electronegativity than hydrogen atoms, a molecule of
water carries a slight negative charge, whereas the hydrogen atoms are slightly positive. As a result,
water is a polar molecule with an electrical dipole moment. The net interactions between the dipoles
on each molecule cause an effective skin effect at the interface of water with other substances, or air
at the surface, the latter given rise to water’s high surface tension. This dipolar nature contributes to
water molecules’ tendency to form hydrogen bonds, which give rise to water’s many special
properties. The polar nature also favors adhesion to other materials.
Water is primarily a liquid under standard conditions, which is not predicted from its
relationship to other analogous hydrides of the oxygen family in the periodic table, which are gases
such as hydrogen sulfide. Also the elements surrounding oxygen in the periodic table, nitrogen,
fluorine, phosphorus, sulfur and chlorine, all combine with hydrogen to produce gases under standard
conditions. The reason that water forms a liquid is that oxygen is more electronegative than all of
these elements with the exception of fluorine. Oxygen attracts electrons much more strongly than
hydrogen, resulting in a net positive charge on the hydrogen atoms, and a net negative charge on the
oxygen atom. The presence of a charge on each of these atoms gives each water molecule a net dipole
moment. (The bond dipole moment uses the idea of electric dipole moment to measure the polarity of
a chemical bond within a molecule. The bond dipole μ is given by μ = δ d. The bond dipole is
modeled as +δ – δ- with a distance d between the partial charges +δ and δ-. It is a vector, parallel to
the bond axis, pointing from minus to plus, as is conventional for electric dipole moment vectors.
(Some chemists draw the vector the other way around, pointing from plus to minus, but only in
situations where the direction doesn’t matter.) This vector can be physically interpreted as the
movement undergone by electrons when the two atoms are placed a distance d apart and allowed to
interact, the electrons will move from their free state positions to be localized more around the more
electronegative atom.) Electrical attraction between water molecules due to this dipole pulls
individual molecules closer together, making it more difficult to separate the molecules and therefore
raising the boiling point. This attraction is known as hydrogen bonding. The molecules of water are
constantly moving in relation to each other, and the hydrogen bonds are continually breaking and
reforming at timescales faster than 200 femtoseconds However, this bond is strong enough to create
many of the peculiar properties of water described in this article, such as the those that make it
integral to life. Water can be described as a polar liquid that slightly dissociates disproportionately
into the hydronium ion (H3O+(aq)) and an associated hydroxide ion (OH−(aq)).
In other words, an individual molecule of water looks something like this:

while a number of water molecules together look like this:

(For more on this, see, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bond_dipole_moment and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Properties_of_water.)
This makes water ideal as a transport fluid to carry the materials needed by the body of a living
organism to where they are most needed, and protect it from desiccating. Life necessarily lives in the
sea, whether the open ocean, freshwater lakes and streams, or the Hypersea; without water, Earthly
life as we know it would not be possible. It is water that supports the unique chemistry of life. Water
has a memory; it is always aware of where it has been, and keeps the memory of its past experience
encoded in the configuration of the bonds that hold large groups of water molecules together, which
makes possible the successful application of homeopathically prepared medicines as well as
homeopathically prepared elixirs used in Magickal Workings (for more on which, see, e.g., my New
Magicks for a New Age, Volume III, Book 4, Part 1, “Homeopathic Preparations of Qaballistically
Coordinated Elixirs for Use as Drugs in Magickal Workings”). This same property gives living
organisms the ability to respond more appropriately to the chemistry of whatever they ingest, whether
by eating, drinking, breathing, or taking in something through their integuments, than they would if
water did not have this property. To what extent memory as we normally think of it – experience that
can be recalled and sorted through consciously – depends on this isn’t clear, but the likelihood is that
memory and dreams are highly influenced by the flow of fluids through our brains and the rest of our
bodies, and that that flow underpins our emotional lives.

Colors:

Liber 777 gives crimson (ultraviolet) for the King Scale of color; buff, flecked silver-
white for the Queen Scale of color; light translucent pinkish-brown for the Emperor Scale of
color; and stone color for the Empress Scale of color.*
Nicholas de Vore gives “pure white and glistening” for Pisces’ colors, probably in
reference to the pearlescent colors of the nacreous inner linings of the shells of abalone and
oysters.**
Barbara Watters gives gray-green and changeable pastels for the colors of Pisces.†
As with Neptune, and, to some extent, Luna, the colors of Pisces include all those
associated with the sea and great lakes, from deep Prussian blue through grey-green and
storm-grey to the white of sea foam and, perhaps, the blood-red of the sunset reflected off the
ocean, the gold or silver track of the midday Sun across its expanse, and the gleaming white
of the sunlight dancing on the crests of the small waves that often dot the sea during the day
under a clear sky (one of the God Shiva’s titles is “the Sun dancing on the waters”).
*Liber 777, Columns XV-XVIII.

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 57.

†Watters, op. cit., p. 34.

Patterns and compounds of color:

Gods:

Greek: Okeanos (Oceanus),* the World Ocean which the Greeks and Romans believed to be
an enormous river circling the world in much the same way that the Great Southern
Ocean encircles Antarctica and bounds the most southern reaches of the other
continents; Poseidon,** Amphitrite (wife of Poseidon); the Old Man of the Sea
(Nereus, Proteus, Glaucus and Phorkys) †

*Strictly speaking, Oceanus was the ocean-stream at the Equator in which floated the habitable
hemisphere (oikoumene οἰκουμένη). In Greek mythology, this world-ocean was personified as a
Titan, a son of Uranus and Gaia. In Hellenistic and Roman mosaics, this Titan was often depicted as
having the upper body of a muscular man with a long beard and horns (often represented as the claws
of a crab), and the lower torso of a serpent.

**One of Poseidon’s titles is “Earth-Shaker.” He is associated with earthquakes, which normally would
be ascribed to the rulership of Uranus. But the title comes from the fact that the Greeks, who were no
fools, frequently observed tsunamis lashing the land after a quake at sea, and realized that the two
phenomena were causally connected, i.e., the under-ocean quake gave rise to the tsunami that soon
hit land. Since tsunamis take the form of enormous waves, and waves are ruled by Poseidon, they
concluded that Poseidon had caused the quake, as well. Hence His title,”Earth-Shaker.”

†Homer’s halios geron or Old Man of the Sea: Nereus, Proteus, Glaucus and Phorkys. Each one is a
shape-shifter, a prophet, and the father of either radiantly beautiful nymphs or hideous monsters (or
both, in the case of Phorkys). Nymphs and monsters blur, for Hesiod relates that Phorkys was wed to
the “beautiful-cheeked” Ceto, whose name is merely the feminine of the monstrous Cetus, to whom
Andromeda was due to be sacrificed. Each appearance in myth tends to emphasize a different aspect
of the archetype: Proteus and Nereus as shape-shifters and tricksters, Phorkys as a father of monsters,
Nereus and Glaucus for truth-telling, Nereus for the beauty of his daughters.
Each one of these Old Men is the father or grandfather of many nymphs and/or monsters, who
often bear names that are either metaphorical (Thetis, “establishment”; Telesto, “success”) or
geographical (Rhode from “Rhodes”; Nilos, “Nile”). Each cluster of Old Man and daughters is
therefore a kind of pantheon in miniature, each one a different possible configuration of the spiritual,
moral and physical world writ small - and writ around the sea.

Roman: Neptune; Oceanus

Semitic: Dagon
Egyptian: Anubis; Kephra, as the scarab in Trump XVIII, The Moon
USA:
Celtic:
 Creiddylad (Cordelia): Celtic (Welsh) goddess, daughter of Llyr (Lir); she later
appeared in Shakespeare’s King Lear as the king’s daughter Cordelia.
Dylan: Welsh sea God; brother of Lleu, eventually slain by Govannon.
Fand: Wife of the Irish sea God Manannan.
Lir (Welsh Llyr): Irish sea god. Welsh sea god. Father of Bran, Branwen, and
Manannan.
Manannan mac Lir: Irish God of the sea. He was the son of Lir (the name Lir itself
meant “sea”) and the husband of Fand. One of his sons was the mortal warrior-king
Mongan. His Welsh equivalent was Manawydan ap Llyr. In addition to ruling over the seas,
Manannan also determined the weather. He ruled over Tir na n-Og, the Irish Otherworld,
said to lie under the sea. He was also said to reside on the Isle of Man, which derived its
name from him. Manannan was depicted as a handsome warrior wearing splendid armor. He
traveled over the surface of the sea in a chariot as though riding over a plain. Although not
mentioned in the accounts of the two battles of Magh Tuireadh, he later came to be
numbered among the Tuatha De Danann, the foremost family of Irish gods.
Manawydan ap Llyr: Welsh version of the Celtic sea god, known to the Irish as
Manannan mac Lir.
Tethra: In Irish myth, the Fomorii sea God and God of the Otherworld.
Shoney: A Celtic sea deity recognized in Britain.

Hindu: Shiva; Varuna

Buddhism:
Voudon: Olokun, God of Oceanic Abysses and the Unconscious.
SubGenius:

“Bob,” as chief martyr of the Church of the SubGenius, and He Who Succeeds by
Screwing Up Totally.
St. Gerry Reith, a High Church scribe and early martyr of the Church.
JHVH-1, Who is duplicitous, sneaky, cruel, treacherous, confused, and a lush Who
makes too many stupid bar-bets; He is also a SubGenius analog of Odin (Who is one of the
sources of the design of Trump XII, The Hanged Man, associated with Mem and Neptune,
ruler of Pisces)
Nhee-Ghee, the Great Discordian Malefic (He is also associated with Saturn).

Discordianism: Eris. Chaos. The Emperor Joshua Norton.

H. P. Lovecraft:

As Polynesian and other Oceanic peoples figure prominently in the Cthulhu Mythos
created by Lovecraft and his colleagues, their deities, spirits, and demons of the sea
should be included here.
Dagon, the Deep Ones, and Great Cthulhu, all characters created by Lovecraft, are
associated with the sea.
The Fungi from Yuggoth.
Cthulhu, Who sleeps in His house in drowned R’lyeh.
H. P. Lovecraft Himself, as First Prophet of the Starry Wisdom Cult and as the Suf-
ferer, who may also have been a battered child (Djehuti, associated with Neptune
because He is Lord of Orphans, is also Protector of Battered Children). Additionally,
Lovecraft was one of the greatest of the Great Dreamers; dreams are ruled by Pisces and
Neptune.

Stephen King:
LaVeyan Satanism:
Szekely (Romany Gypsy):
Chinese:
Japanese:
Judaism:
Christianity:
Islam:
Scandinavian/Norse:
The French Enlightenment:
Russian:
Hungarian:
African:
Southeast Asia:
Oceania:*

Adaro (Polynesia and Melanesia): A sea God. In the myths of the Solomon Islands, an
Adaro is a malevolent sea-spirit in the shape of a fish-man with all fins on his feet and gills
behind his ears. He has a horn like a shark’s back fin and a pike on his head like a sword
fish or sawfish. An Adaro can travel along rainbows and kill men by shooting poisonous
flying fish at them.
Aremata-rorua and Aremata-popoa: ‘Long-wave’ and ‘Short-wave’, two ocean demons
who destroy mariners. They are greatly feared by Polynesian mariners because they were
totally at the mercy of their immense power.
Atanea: A dawn Goddess in some South Pacific islands, who created the seas when She
miscarried and filled the hollows of the earth with amniotic fluid.
Atutuahi (or Autahi): The southern star Canopus, Alpha Carinae, God of the Heavens,
which guided Polynesian navigators on their months-long voyages. Atutuahi is addressed in
hymns as the “Mother of the Moon and the Star.”
Dakuwanga: The Fijian Shark-God, eater of lost souls.
Fe’e: In Samoan mythology, he is the War-God, who is described as a huge octopus,
living under the sea with his tentacles reaching to the far corners of the known world like a
huge compass with eight hands. Fe’e was believed to cause thunderstorms in which his voice
would be heard. The king’s diviners would listen and if the god’s voice was inauspicious, all
war plans would be postponed. Fe’e courted the daughter of the King of Upolu, and when the
king refused him, he knocked a hole in the barrier reef protecting the island, there the city of
Apia now lies. There he had a stone house built for himself, the ruins of which have been
pointed out to researchers. Under the sea he had a palace called Bale-Fe’e. (Shades of
Cthulhu in R’lyeh!)
Kanaloa (Hawaii): God of the sea.
Magantu: The great white shark, a monster fish able to swallow a pahi canoe whole.
Milu: Ruler of the underworld.
Moeuhane (Hawaii): God of dreams.
Pere: Goddess of the waters which surround islands. Her mother was Tahinariki or
Haoumea, or Papa. She married Wahiaroa. One morning Pere wanted to travel so Her
mother gave her the ocean in a jar to take with Her and later to carry Her in her royal yacht.
In the beginning there was no sea at all, so Pere poured it out whenever She wanted to go. At
first She carried the ocean in a jar on Her head, and later, when She had poured it all out,
the ocean carried Her in Her lovely divine ship. Thus a mother will give birth to a son who
will one day support her.
Ruahatu (Tahiti): A sea god.
Taburimai: In the myths of the people of Kiribati, Taburimai was the ancestor of the
people, son of the demiGod Bakoa. He had a brother Teanoi, the hammer-headed shark. One
day the people of his island plotted to kill Taburimai but Bakoa got wind of the evil plans.
He asked Teanoi to carry his brother to safety. This he did by swimming away across the sea.
Then, having left his brother safely on the beach at Samoa, Teanoi flew up into the sky
where he can still be seen (probably as the constellation Pisces*).
Tangaroa: God of the ocean who breathes only twice in 24 hours thus creating the tides.
(Polynesia) The Maori peoples’ lord of the ocean, and the supreme God who created all
the other gods and mankind.
Tagaloa: The Samoan Ocean-God See Tangaroa
Tikokura: A wave-God of monstrous size whose enormous power and quick flaring
temper are to be greatly feared.
Tini Rau: Lord of the Fishes. (Polynesia) God of the sea.
Turi-a-faumea (Polynesia): God of fish and reptiles.
 Ukupanipo (Hawaii): God of sharks.

*Note the striking similarity of names of Gods and Goddesses and other terminology of Oceania,
along with certain cultural conventions, with those of ancient Egypt, the Hebrews, the ancient
Greeks, etc. For example, consider the Melanesian trickster-hero Maui, who became the God of
earthquakes. He is also the most famous folktale character of Polynesia is Maui, the trickster
hero with powers almost equal to those of a God, who steals fire for man (the legend describes
the descent of Maui to the underworld, where he learns the art of making fire by rubbing two
sticks together), fishes up the islands of the South Pacific, traps the sun to lengthen the day, and
helps raise the sky. Maui is also known in Micronesian and some Melanesian folklore. Maui was
born to Taranga, who wrapped the child in her hair and gave him to the sea-fairies. Maui is
responsible for many things, including the birth of the myriads of islands in Oceania, the
coconut, and the length of the day, which was once too short until Maui beat Ra with a stick and
forced him to travel across the sky more slowly. Ra is a God of Tama, specifically Nui-te-ra, the
Sun-God – but that is also the name of the Sun God worshipped by ancient Egyptians. There are
also other striking similarities between Old World languages and Oceanic languages, such as
“cohen” (meaning “priest” in Hebrew) and “kahuna” (an Hawaiian priest), generally
ecclesiastical in nature, suggesting that these terms, unlike more idiomatic usage, which changes
continuously, are from great antiquity. These similarities of linguistic forms and names of Gods
and Goddesses between ancient Old World and Oceanic cultures suggest that perhaps peoples
from both areas of the world came from a still more ancient culture or cultural region and
somehow later became widely dispersed across the globe.
In fact, some geologists and other scientists point out that the Black Sea likely formed
around 7,500 years ago as the result of the bursting of an ice dam holding back the waters of the
Mediterranean from what was then a vast freshwater glacier lake; the world was beginning to
come out of the Ice Age then, and as it warmed, ice dams like that one finally melted through,
allowing lakes and seas to mingle that theretofore had been walled off from one another by the
ice. When that happened, humans living in communities around what had been a huge
freshwater lake, now suddenly turned into a saltwater sea by the overwhelming inrush of
seawater from the Mediterranean, had to run for their lives. The survivors must have been
scattered in all directions, east, west, north, south. And wherever they eventually settled, they
remembered the flood that had destroyed their homes and forced them into exile, giving rise to
all the legends of an enormous, world-covering flood, including the Biblical version recounted in
Genesis.
Some of those exiles ended up in the Middle East, others in North Africa. Still others
continued their trek down through Africa and out from its eastern coast, into the Indian Ocean
and thence to the Pacific, many dropping out to settle on archipelagos they encountered on the
way. That process probably took thousands of years to complete itself as it eventually gave rise to
all the peoples and cultures of Oceania.
Those who remained in the Old World became the Egyptians, the Jews, and countless other
Old World peoples. But they had shared liturgical languages with their absent cousins, and as
liturgical languages and terms used ecclesiastically tend not to change much over time, they
retained many terms and names bearing striking similarities to those still in use today in
Oceania: Ra, kahuna, and so many others. No direct proof of this has yet been unearthed, but
the indirect evidence, mostly linguistic and mythological, is so striking and so telling that it
can’t be disregarded.
Nota bene: If such a flood due to the melting of a Late Ice Age ice dam actually occurred, it
certainly wasn’t the only one. The evidence for many such have been found wherever the Ice bit
deep. One such is in the Scablands of my state, Washington, which from the air can clearly be
seen to have been scoured out by onrushing waters. Numerous other places like it abound in the
Northern Hemisphere.
For a detailed listing of deities and spirits of Oceania, see, e.g.,
http://www.janeresture.com/oceania_myths/mythology.htm
 Native Australian:
Eskimo:
Central American:
American Indian:
American folklore:
Science-fiction: The Land of Oz: The Wizard (who was, after all, an illusionist par
excellence, not a true Magickian)

World Religions:

SubGenius (because of its martyred founder, J. R. “Bob” Dobbs, as well as the way it
confuses all outsiders and most insiders [Erisianism]). Islam (it came into existence in the
Aeon of Osiris). The Starry Wisdom Cult of Lovecraft (associated with Neptune’s Sephirah,
2, Chokmah). Christianity. Ninpo taijutsu (because of its subtlety and flowing aspects).

Biblical associations:

The Book of Jonah (Hebrew: Sefer Yonah) (the story of Jonah and the whale)
Genesis 1:6-10, Genesis 1:20-22
Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus to the Romans, is traditionally believed to be a Pisces.
But Jesus may have ordered Judas to betray him, in order to fulfill his divine mission, in
which case Judas would also be a martyr to history because of the villification heaped on him
due to his obedience to his master. Judas also committed suicide, an act ruled by Pisces and
the 12th House.

Countries:

Geraldine Davis gives Normandy, the Sahara Desert, Portugal, Egypt, and the southern
part of Asia Minor.
Barbara Watters gives Portugal, the Normandy Coast, and Galicia in Spain.

Cities:

Geraldine Davis gives Lancaster, Ratisbon, Alexandria, and Seville.

Barbara Watters gives Alexandria and Seville.
Hollywood, California, the Mecca of the film industry, is also associated with Pisces and
Qoph, as is Cannes, in France, for the same reason (the film industry is ruled by Neptune
and Pisces)

Buddhist meditation: Meditation on conduct

Magickal Power: Bewitchments, casting illusions

Perfume: Liber 777 gives Ambergris.

*Liber 777, XLII.

Musical tone: B natural.*

Qlippoth:**
 Neshimiron or Nashimiron: Manifestation of the female current, breeds other dragons,
bestowing power of female dragons who seeks their power, sex Magick (Tantra), awakens
the Luciferian essence. Revealing secrets, revealing the hidden, to undo someone, psychic
powers, finding spies, undermine someone’s spell, to capture someone, to hide something,
bindings, escape from an issue, confine evil, free an issue, karmic release, invisibility,
finding someone, revealing deception, finding the truth.
Crowley feels that Qoph could easily lead to encounters with Qlippoth, an illusionary
prone path.

*The musical notes of the signs of the Zodiac and musical tempos of the planets are, in order:

Zodiacal Sign Note Planet Planetary Tempo

Aries C Moon 98.6 BPM
Taurus C# or Db Mercury 66.2 BPM
Gemini D Venus 103.7 BPM
Cancer D# or Eb Sun 118.3 BPM
Leo E Mars 67.8 BPM
Virgo F Jupiter 86.1 BPM
Libra F# or Gb Saturn 69.3 BPM
Scorpio G Uranus 97.2 BPM
Sagittarius G# or Ab Neptune 99.1 BPM
Capricorn A Pluto 65.7 BPM
Aquarius A# or Bb
Pisces B

Other musical correspondences:

Musical Notes of the Paths and Letters of the Hebrew Alphabet

Path/Letter Qaballistic Tarot Trump Note
Correspondence
Aleph Air, Uranus 0, The Fool E
Beth Mercury I, The Magician/Magus E
Gimel Luna II, The High Priestess G#
Daleth Venus III, The Empress F#
Heh Aries IV, The Emperor C
Vav Taurus C#
Za’in Gemini D
Cheth Cancer D#
Teth Leo E
Yod Virgo F
Kaph Jupiter A#
Lamed Libra F#
Mem Water, Neptune G#
Nun Scorpio G
Samekh Sagittarius G#
A’ain Capricorn XV, The Devil A
Peh Mars XVI, The Tower C
Tzaddi Aquarius XVII, The Star A#
Qoph Pisces XVIII, The Moon B
Resh Sun D
Shin Fire, Pluto C
 Tav Saturn, Earth (planet, A
plane of existence),
Earth (Element)

Alchemical Correspondences
The Elements Note Alchemical Note
Materia
Fire C Sulfur C
Water G# Mercury E
Air E Salte G#
Earth A

Colors, Musical Notes, and Planets

Color Note Planet (Queen Planet (King Scale
Scale of Color) of Color)
Red (Scarlet) C Mars Mars
Red-Orange C#
Orange D Mercury Sun
Yellow E E Sun Mercury
Sun Mercury
Yellow-Green F
Green F# Venus Venus
Blue-Green G
Blue (Cobalt) G# Jupiter Moon
Blue-Violet A Saturn Saturn
Violet A# Moon Jupiter
Red-Violet (Magenta) B

Chakras, Colors, Frequency, and Note Correspondences

Chakra Color Frequency Note
Svadhisthana Orange 9hz D
Solar Plexus Yellow 10hz E
Heart Green 10.5hz F
Throat Blue 12hz G
3rd eye/Brow Indigo 13hz A
Crown White 15 hz B

Suggested tonality of extra dimensions and their corresponding chakras

Dimension Chakra Lower Plane Higher Plane
Sound Sound
Physical Plane/Body Root Chakra Akin to a low rumbling Soft whistling sound
thunder
Astral Plane/Body Svadhisthana Chakra Roar of the ocean Akin to gentle wind
blowing through trees
Mental Plane/Body Solar Plexus Bell/Gong Sound Waterfall, Rushing
Water
Intuitive Plane/Body Heart Chakra Buzzing, like a light Flute-like Tones
swarming of bees
Spiritual Plane/Body Throat Chakra Wind Humming “ohm”
Collective Mind 3rd Eye, the Brow Similar to distant Similar to deep
 Plane/Body Chakra violins carried by the woodwinds
wind
Divine Plane/Body Crown Chakra Soft “huuuu...” All sound and no sound
felt as opposed to heard

The Chakras
Chakra Planet Alchemica Tattwa Sephirah Musical Geomantic
l Materia Note Sigil
Root Saturn Lead Malkuth E Amissio,
Saturn Prithivi Conjunctio,
(earth) Carcer
Lead
Svadhisthana Mars Iron Apas Yesod A# Populus,
(Water) Rubeus,
Laetitia, Via
Solar Plexus Jupiter Tin Tejas (Fire) Hod and C Puer, Fortuna
Netzach, Major,
Tiphareth Acquisitio,
Fortuna
minor
Heart Sun Gold Vayu (Air) Tiphareth, G# Albus,
Da’ath Puella,
Tristitia
Throat Venus Copper Akasha Geburah and Caput
Venus Akasha Chesed Draconis,
(Spirit-Ether) Cauda
Copper Draconis
3rd Eye Luna Silver All 5 3rd Eye
Tattwas Binah and
Synthesized Chokmah
Crown Mercury Quicksilver Akasha Kether, A
Singularity
presented as a
point

Brainwave Frequency Rates

Type of Brain Rhythm Frequency
Reptilian Beta 13-40hz
Limbic system Alpha 8-13hz
Neo-mammalian Theta 4-8hz
4th Brain (like the Delta 0-4hz
Crown Chakra in
nature)
5-7th Brains (like Slower than delta Slower than delta
Kether in nature)

Enochian
 Enochian English Astrological Musical
Equivalent Note
Un A Air, Uranus E
Pe B Mercury E
E B
Ged G Luna G#
Gal D Venus F#
Graph C Aries E
Orth C# Taurus F
Ceph Z Gemini D
Na-Hath H Cancer D#
Gon I, J, Y Virgo F
Veh C, K Jupiter A#
Ur L Libra F#
Tal M Water, G#
Neptune
Drun N Scorpio G
Pal X Sagittarius G#
Med O Capricorn A
Mals F Mars C
Ger Q Aquarius A#
Don R Pisces B
Fam S Sun D
Gisa T Fire, Pluto C
Vau U, V, W Saturn, Earth A
(Element),
Earth (planet)

**As the Qlippoth are intimately associated with Pisces and the 12 th House of the horoscope – as in
Gemini and the 3rd House, the Moon has her esoteric rulership in this house and sign, where she is at
her strongest, and the Qlippoth are a sublunar phenomenon, tremendously influenced by the tides of
life, and easily evoked when Luna is in that sign or house – notes on the Qlippoth are in order here.
The Qlippoth and infernal regions and their correspondences for all the Paths and Sephiroth are as
follows:

The Qlippoth, Tunnels of Set & Nightside

Tunnel Translation Path Astrological Note Color
Letter Correspondence
Amprodias Vampiric Aleph Air, Uranus E Luminous
Sylphs pale yellow
and emerald
flickered
with gold
Baratchial Poison of God Beth Mercury E Deep yellow
and indigo
rayed with
violet
Gargophias Lemurs Gimel Luna G# Silver and
(“Spirits of the black
Night”)
Dagdagiel Babalon Daleth Venus F# Vivid sky
blue &
bright rose
rayed with
 pale green
Hemthterith The Herd Heh Aries A# Lurid red &
glowing red
Uriens The Bloody Vav Taurus C# Flame and
One brown
Zamradiel The Clangers Za’in Gemini D New leather
yellow &
mauve
Characith The Black Cheth Cancer D# Dark
Ones greenish
brown and
amber
Temphioth The Flaming Teth Leo E Sharp
Ones greenish
yellow &
gray
Yamatu The Scratchers Yod Virgo F Yellowish
green and
slate
Kurgasiax The Smiters Kaph Jupiter A# Bright blue
rayed with
yellow
Lafcursiax The Clayish Lamed Libra F# Pale green
Ones & rich blue
Malkunofat The Deep Mem Water, Neptune G# Deep blue
Ones (shades and sea
of H. P. green
Lovecraft!)
Niantiel The Brazen Nun Scorpio G Indigo
Ones brown and
greenish
blue
Saksaksalim The Snaky Samekh Sagittarius G# Bright
Ones yellow and
dark blue
A’ano’nin The Fishy A’ain Capricorn A Black and
Ones indigo
Parafaxitas The Arsonists Peh Mars C Bright red
and
Emerald
Tzuflifu The Bestial Tzaddi Aquarius B# Black and
Ones blue
Qulielfi Malignant Qoph Pisces B Slug-slime
Women silver &
stone
Raflifu The Hagglers Resh Sun D Rayed red
and amber
Shalicu Tannim Shin Fire, Pluto C Vermilion
and emerald
Thantifaxath Ghouls Tav Saturn, Earth B# Black and
(Element), Earth blue
(planet)
 The Qlippoth, Tunnels of Set & Nightside
Qlippothic Shells Translation Path Sephirah or Qlippothic
other Astrology
Qaballistic
Element
Qemetiel The crowd of Ain No-thing
Gods
Belial Without God Ain Soph No Limit
Athiel Uncertainty Ain Soph Aur Limitless
Light
Thaumiel Twins of God Kether Pluto, the
Primum
Mobile
Ogiel The Hinderers Chokmah Neptune, the
Starry Heavens
Satariel The Binah Uranus
Concealers
Masak Mavdil Place for Da’ath Saturn
rejected
failures
Gasheklah The Smiters Chesed Jupiter
Golachab The Arsonist Geburah Mars
Tageriron The Hagglers Tiphareth Sol
Oreb Zaraq The Ravens of Netzach Venus
Dispersion
Samael Poison of God Hod Mercury
Gamaliel The Obscene Yesod Luna
ones
Lilith Queen of the Malkuth Earth
Night
Satariel The Aleph Air, Uranus
Concealers
Samael Poison of God Beth Mercury
Gamaliel The Obscene Gimel Luna
ones
Oreb Zaraq The Ravens of Daleth Venus
Dispersion
Beiriron The Herd Heh Aries
Adimiron The Bloody Vav Taurus
Ones
Tzelilimiron The Clangers Za’in Gemini
Shichiriron The Black Cheth Cancer
Ones
Shalhebiron The Flaming Teth Leo
Ones
Tzaphiriron The Scratchers Yod Virgo
Gasheklah The Smiters Kaph Jupiter
Abiriron The Clayish Lamed Libra
Ones
Ogiel The Hinderers Mem Water,
Neptune
Necheshthiron The Brazen Nun Scorpio
Ones
Nachashiron The Snaky Samekh Sagittarius
Ones
Dagdagiron The Fishy A’ain Capricorn
 Ones
Golachab The Arsonist Peh Mars
Bahimiron The Tzaddi Aquarius
Bestial Ones
Aquarius
Nashimiron Malignant Qoph Pisces
Women
Tageriron The Hagglers Resh Sol
Thaumiel Twins of God Shin Fire
Satariel The Tav Saturn, Earth
Concealers (the Element)
Lilith (Key 32 bis) Queen of the Tav Earth (the
Night planet)
Thaumiel (Key 31 Twins of God Shin Pluto
bis)

The Inferno
River of Element Qlippothic Cardinal
Dragon Direction
Acheron Earth Typhon North
Cocytus Air Samael East
Phlegethon Fire Lucifer South
Styx Water Leviathan West

See http://aleph9.blogspot.com/2009/02/occult-music-correspondence-tables-to.html, etc. for

more information.

Legendary orders of being:

Phantoms, werewolves
All spirits of the ocean, such as mermaids, nymphs, sirens, Lorelei, etc.

Alchemical references:

The decomposition of materials into their Watery and Mutable aspects

.Metals, stones, and minerals:

Liber 777 gives the pearl (Column XL).

All stones, gems, and minerals associated with the sea are correspondents of Qoph.
Alan Oken gives chrysolite, pumice, gravel, sand, topaz, amethyst, coral, aquamarine,
ivory, platinum, neptunium (atomic number 93, associated with Neptune), and radium
(atomic number 88).*
Goldstein-Jacobson adds amethyst, aquamarine, beryl, and such artificial substances as
glass, porcelain, plastics, and other imitation or synthetic materials.**
De Vore adds lithium. †
Watters adds the pearl, made by oysters, oceanic creatures, and salt, because of the
saltiness of ocean waters. ††
George Frederick Kunz gives amethyst.†††
Pisces and its Lord, Neptune, co-rule the actinides the chemical elements which have
atomic numbers 89 (actinium) through 103 (they share this dominion with Pluto and
 Scorpio). These are analogs of the Uranus-ruled lanthanides, beings the next series of that
kind up from the latter in the Periodic Table.
Metals whose dissolved salts are plentiful in sea-water are Piscean. Calcium carbonate,
or limestone, is a rock which forms in the ocean, and could not form elsewhere due to the
conditions of temperature, pressure, and chemistry necessary for its creation, and it is
therefore ruled by Neptune. ‡ The shells of marine animals, some of which are used in
jewelry, or prized for their beauty and/or rarity, and so qualify as precious or semiprecious
stones, are Neptunian.
By the same token, iodine (Z=53) is ruled by Pisces, because of its pervasive presence in
seawater. ‡‡ Curiously, iodine is necessary for the functions of the thyroid gland, which
produces thyroxin, a hormone that enables the body to convert stored food to metabolic
energy, reflecting the association of Pisces ruler, Neptune, with Chokmah, Pure Force, the
Father, Whose Element is Fire/Spirit.
It is of interest in this context that the metal of Mercury, quicksilver or mercury metal
(Z=80), displays such Piscean properties as elusiveness (try grabbing some with your bare
hands!). The sign rulerships of mercury are 180° across the sky from those of Neptune, and
therefore in opposition to Neptune’s dignities, so that they provide reflections or mirrors of
Neptune’s qualities – qualities with which Mercury Himself, like so many Mercurial
phenomena and the metal mercury, is richly endowed!
Neptune, ruler of Pisces, is also one of the rulers of natural gas and oil. Though these
are not solid substances, and in that sense are not “stones” or “gems,” they are highly valu-
able sources of energy for technology and for use in the home, and therefore sources of
wealth, as gemstones are, and thus subtle versions of precious stones.
Neptune rules fluids of all kinds. These include not only liquids, but also gas es,
plasmas, glasses, and matter so finely divided that it flows like a liquid, e.g., jeweler’s rouge
(pumice) and finest-grade powdered sugar. In terms of physical phas es, Neptune rules the
liquid phase, as Uranus rules the gaseous phase, Pluto the plasmoid phase, and Saturn the
solid phase; but Neptune also rules the fluid or flowing, Watery aspects of any of the latter
three phases.
Finally, the element helium (Z=2) is ruled by Neptune, since its atomic number is 2, that
of Neptune’s Sephirah, and is found naturally only in gaseous form. Element 23, vanadium,
likewise is ruled by Neptune, since its atomic number is the same as the Key Number of
Neptune’s Path, Mem. And Element 40, zirconium, is ruled by Neptune as well, since its
atomic number is the same as the value of Mem. These elements are therefore also
associated with Pisces, over which Neptune has dominion.

*Oken, op. cit., pp. 164, 224.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 46.

Though since the name of that element itself literally means “stone substance,” it is more likely to be
†

ruled by Saturn. This is especially so today because of the ominous connotations due to this metal’s
use in manufacture of thermonuclear bombs.
††
Traditionally, however, salt is associated with Saturn.

†††Kunz, op. cit., p. 345.

‡
Saturn traditionally rules this mineral; as in the case with salt, this indicates the delegation to Neptune of
certain of the rulerships of Saturn.
‡‡
Traditionally, this chemical element is ruled by Luna – of which Neptune is a high er octave.

Plants, real and imaginary:

 Liber 777 gives unicellular organisms and opium.*
John Lust gives algae, seaweed, and water mosses.**
For Neptune, which rules Pisces and the 12 th House, Ivy Goldstein-Jacobson gives
parasitic and medicinal plants, tobacco, plants used to produce drugs, kelp, and dwarfed
plants and trees (e.g., bonsais); these presumably would also be associated with the sign and
house.†
Alan Oken gives seaweed, ferns, mosses, water lilies, and all other plants which grow in
water.†
Mescaline, or 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine, a naturally-occurring psychedelic
alkaloid of the phenethylamine class, is ruled by Neptune, Pisces, and the 12 th House. This
drug is mainly used as an entheogen (an entheogen (“God inside us,” from εν- ( en), meaning
“in, within,” θεος- (theo), meaning “God, divine,” and γενος (-gen) meaning “creates,
generates”) is a psychoactive substance used in a religious, shamanic, or spiritual context),
and as a tool to supplement various practices for transcendence, including in meditation,
psychonautics, art projects, and psychedelic psychotherapy. It occurs naturally in the peyote
cactus (Lophophora williamsii), the San Pedro cactus (Echinopsis pachanoi), and the
Peruvian Torch cactus (Echinopsis peruviana), and in a number of other members of the
Cactaceae plant family. It is also found in small amounts in certain members of the Fabaceae
(bean) family, including Acacia berlandieri. Mescaline cacti should therefore also be
included here as plants ruled by Neptune, Pisces, and the 12 th House.
Datura, a genus of nine species of vespertine flowering plants belonging to the family
Solanaceae, is ruled by Neptune, Pisces, and the 12 th House. These precise and natural
distribution of Datura is uncertain, owing to its extensive cultivation and naturalization
throughout the temperate and tropical regions of the globe. Its distribution within the
Americas, however, is most likely restricted to the United States and Mexico, where the
highest species diversity occurs. Datura are herbaceous, leafy annuals and short-lived
perennials which can reach up to 2 meters in height. The leaves are alternate, 10–20 cm long
and 5–18 cm broad, with a lobed or toothed margin. The flowers are erect or spreading (not
pendulous like those of the closely allied Brugmansia), trumpet-shaped, 5–20 cm long and
4–12 cm broad at the mouth; colors vary from white to yellow, pink, and pale purple. The
fruit is a spiny capsule 4–10 cm long and 2–6 cm broad, splitting open when ripe to release
the numerous seeds. The seeds disperse freely over pastures, fields and even wasteland
locations. Datura, like some other Solanaceae, such as deadly nightshade (Atropa
belladonna, also known as belladonna, a source of the drug atropine), henbane (Hyoscyamus
niger, also known as stinking nightshade or black henbane), and mandrake (containing
deliriant hallucinogenic tropane alkaloids such as atropine, scopolamine, apoatropine, and
hyoscyamine), belongs to the classic “witches’ weeds.” Most parts of the plants contain
toxic hallucinogens, and Datura has a long history of use for causing delirious states and
death. It was well known as an essential ingredient of love potions and witches’ brews.
Datura, like numerous other hallucinogenic plants, is extremely toxic, and extracts from it
can be used for poisoning. Neptune, Pisces, and the 12th House also rule poisons,
poisonings, assassinations, and murder in general, so Datura’s inclusion here is doubly
appropriate.
Mandrake is also ruled by Neptune, Pisces, and the 12 th House because of its use by
occultists and witches for its intoxicant properties and its highly poisonous nature. It is co-
ruled by Aquarius and Tzaddi because of the vaguely manlike shape of its roots, but its
biochemistry is far more closely related to its essential nature, which is determined by its
genes, so its primary rulers are Neptune, Pisces, and the 12 th House, and its primary
Qaballistic association is with Qoph. In fact, for these reasons, all poisonous plants and all
hallucinogenic plants are associated with Qoph and Pisces, and should be included here.
Aconitum, a.k.a. aconite, monkshood, wolfsbane, leopard’s bane, women’s bane, Devil’s
helmet, and blue rocket, a genus of flowering plant belonging to the buttercup family
(Ranunculaceae), for example, a classic poisoner’s tool, is a typical Piscean plant. So is the
Giant Hogweed.
Giant Hogweed (Heracleum mantegazzianum, a.k.a. giant cow parsley) is a plant in the
family Apiaceae, native to the Caucasus Region and Central Asia. It may reach 2–5 meters
(rarely to 7 m) tall. Except for size, it closely resembles Common Hogweed (Heracleum
 sphondylium), Heracleum sosnowskyi, or Garden Angelica (Angelica archangelica). It is
phototoxic and considered to be a noxious weed in many jurisdictions. Giant Hogweed is
phototoxic. Its sap can cause phytophotodermatitis (severe skin inflammations) when the
skin is exposed to sunlight or to UV-rays. Initially the skin colors red and starts itching.
Then blisters form as in burns within 48 hours. They form black or purplish scars that can
last several years. Hospitalization may be necessary. Presence of minute amounts of sap in
the eyes can lead to temporary or even permanent blindness. These reactions are caused by
the presence of linear derivatives of furocoumarin in its leaves, roots, stems, flowers and
seeds. These chemicals can get into the nucleus of the epithelial cells, forming a bond with
the DNA, causing the cells to die. The brown color is caused by the production of melanin by
furocoumarins. In Germany, where this plant has become a real nuisance, there were about
16,000 victims in 2003. Children should be kept away from Giant Hogweed. Protective
clothing, including eye protection, should be worn when handling or digging it. If skin is
exposed, the affected area should be washed thoroughly with soap and water and the exposed
skin protected from the sun for several days. Those individuals who are allergic to the plant
could die as a result of anaphylactic shock if exposed to it, for which reason Giant Hogweed
is ruled by Neptune, Pisces, and the 12th House.
The list of plants that are highly toxic and/or which contain hallucinogenic substances
would probably stretch from here to the Moon, so the interested reader is advised to find a
good search engine and go looking for them on the World Wide Web. Suffice it to say that
all of these are ruled – or, in the case of plants with more than one appropriate astrological
ruler, co-ruled – by Qoph, Pisces and their astrological correspondents. (If you’re wondering
why so many plants are capable of sickening or killing animal life that tries to ingest them or
gets their juices in their eyes or makes skin contact with them, think about a typical plants
sedentary way of life. It can’t get up and run away from predators, so it has to defend itself
with whatever it can, and that means thorns, toxins, and other deadly things it can deploy
without moving. It also needs some nitrogen in its diet, and any toxins it produces, such as
on its stems, in its blossoms, etc. can do duty as food-providers for the plant by causing
animals that try to ingest it or which brush against it to die on the ground around its roots or
in or on its blossoms or leaves, so that as their rotting carcasses decompose, the products of
that decomposition can be ingested by absorption or more active means (e.g., as carnivorous
plants ingest their prey), giving it nitrogen and other nutrients in quantity, which it can get
in no other way.)

*Liber 777, Column XXXIX. Presumably “unicellular organisms” refers to single-celled eukarya such as
amoeba, which have true cellular nuclei and membranes around the nuclei to protect them, as well as
prokaryotic bacteria and archaea. (Domain Eukarya includes all multicellular organisms, including
us as well as all other animals and all plants, and fungi, as well as some single-celled organisms, e.g.,
the aforementioned amoeba, whose cells do exhibit traits characteristic of eukaryotic cells. Members
of Domain Bacteria, on the other hand, generally do not have membrane-bound organelles in their
cells, but may nevertheless have such intracellular entities, and often have highly complex internal
architecture. Extremophiles, members of Domain Archaea, who have no cellular organelles, and only
simple intracellular architecture. Bacteria and archaea lack true cellular nuclei and nuclear
membranes, and have but single loops of naked, double-stranded DNA per cell.) The inclusion of
bacteria here makes sense, because Pisces and the 12 th House of the horoscope rule public health
issues, and in particular infectious diseases that tend to spread widely, such as those caused by
bacteria. But given that, viruses would be more likely candidates for inclusion here than archaea,
which are distinct from bacteria in many ways and are either harmless or beneficial to eukarya, hence
not matters of public health, except when their lack among us or in our environment creates health-
related problems for us, our cultivars, our stock animals, our pets and companion animals, or wild
animals living nearby.
Archaea and bacteria are quite similar in size and shape, although a few archaea have very
unusual shapes, such as the flat and square-shaped cells of Haloquadra walsbyi. Despite this visual
similarity to bacteria, archaea possess genes and several metabolic pathways that are more closely
related to those of eukaryotes, notably the enzymes involved in transcription and translation. Other
aspects of archaean biochemistry are unique, such as their reliance on ether lipids in their cell
 membranes. The archaea exploit a much greater variety of sources of energy than eukaryotes: ranging
from familiar organic compounds such as sugars, to using ammonia, metal ions or even hydrogen gas
as nutrients. Salt-tolerant archaea (the Halobacteria) use sunlight as an energy source and other
species of archaea fix carbon; however, unlike plants and cyanobacteria, no species of archaea is
known to do both. Archaea reproduce asexually and divide by binary fission, fragmentation, or
budding; in contrast to bacteria and eukaryotes, no known species form spores.
Initially, archaea were seen as extremophiles that lived in harsh environments, such as hot
springs and salt lakes, but they have since been found in a wide range of habitats, including soils,
oceans, and marshlands. Archaea are particularly numerous in the oceans, and the archaea in
plankton may be one of the most abundant groups of organisms on the planet. Archaea are now
recognized as a major part of Earth’s life and may play roles in both the carbon cycle and nitrogen
cycle. No clear examples of archaeal pathogens or parasites are known, but they are often mutualists
or commensals. One example are the methanogens that inhabit the gut of humans and ruminants,
where their vast numbers aid digestion. Methanogens are used in biogas production and sewage
treatment, and enzymes from extremophile archaea that can endure high temperatures and organic
solvents are exploited in biotechnology.
But no prokarya or single-celled eukarya such as amoeba are members of Kingdom Plantae.
Instead, they belong under “Creatures in general,” below.
The inclusion of the opium poppy (Papaver somniferum) here is understandable, as Pisces and
the 12th House rule addictions as well as dreams and visions, which opium is said to induce in those
who use it. But in that case, Ephedra (Ephedra sinica) should be included, too. The alkaloids
ephedrine and pseudoephedrine are the active constituents of the plant. Pseudoephedrine is used in
over-the-counter decongestants. Derivatives of ephedrine are used to treat low blood pressure, but
alternatives with reduced cardiovascular risk have replaced it for treating asthma. Ephedrine is also
considered a performance-enhancing drug and is prohibited in most competitive sports. Some species
in the Ephedra genus have no alkaloid content; however, the most commonly used species, E. sinica,
has a total alkaloid content of 1–3% by dry weight. Ephedrine constitutes 40–90% of the alkaloid
content, with the remainder consisting of pseudoephedrine and the demethylated forms of each
compound. The alkaloids present in that plant are potentially addictive, hence the subject of this sign
and house. The same is true for all other plants used to induce visions, dreams, trances, etc., or the
ingestion of which in any form can lead to addiction to them.

**Lust, op. cit., p. 574.

†Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

†Oken, op. cit., p. 164.

Animals, Real and Imaginary:

Liber 777 gives fish and dolphins.*

For Neptune Ivy Goldstein-Jacobson gives shellfish, which presumably are ruled by Pisces
and the 12th House.**
All marine animals, vertebrates and invertebrates, are ruled by Pisces and the 12 th House.
The same is true of animals in great lakes and inland seas, e.g., the Black Sea, whether salt or
fresh, and places such as Mono Lake in California and the Dead Sea in Israel, whose waters are
so salt that they are inhabited only by halophilic extremophiles, brine shrimp, and some algaes.
All animals that have venomous spines or venom glands, or otherwise present a danger from
their venom, are ruled or co-ruled by Pisces. There is no short list of such creatures; their roster
is tremendous. But typical members of this group include, e.g.:

Cuban Solenodon (Solenodon cubanus) & Hispaniolan Solenodon (Solenodon

paradoxus). Solenodons look similar to very large shrews. They both have
venomous bites; the venom is delivered from modified salivary glands via grooves
in their second lower incisors.
 The platypus: The Platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) is a semi-aquatic mammal
endemic to eastern Australia, including Tasmania. Together with the four species of
echidna, it is one of the five extant species of monotremes, the only mammals that
lay eggs instead of giving birth to live young. It is the sole living representative of
its family (Ornithorhynchidae) and genus (Ornithorhynchus), though a number of
related species have been found in the fossil record. The bizarre appearance of this
egg-laying, venomous, duck-billed, beaver-tailed, otter-footed, swimming mammal
baffled European naturalists when they first encountered it, with some considering
it an elaborate fraud. It is one of the few venomous mammals; the male Platypus has
a spur on the hind foot that delivers a venom capable of causing severe pain to
humans. The unique features of the Platypus make it an important subject in the
study of evolutionary biology and a recognizable and iconic symbol of Australia.
This animal is doubly ruled by Pisces due to its aquatic habits.
Eurasian Water Shrew (Neomys fodiens).
Capable of delivering a venomous bite: Northern Short-tailed Shrew (Blarina
brevicauda).
Capable of delivering a venomous bite: Southern Short-tailed Shrew (Blarina
carolinensis) & Elliot’s Short-tailed Shrew (Blarina hylophaga).
Possibly have a venomous bite: European Mole (Talpa europaea).
The European mole, and possibly other species of mole, has toxins in its saliva that can
paralyze earthworms, allowing it to store them for later consumption.
Venomous/poisonous: Slow lorises (Nycticebus coucang, Nycticebus bengalensis,
Nycticebus pygmaeus). Brachial glands on the inside of the elbows of the slow loris
secrete a brown exudate. This exudate is licked and becomes mixed with saliva. A
protein in the secretion, which is similar to the allergen protein isolated from the
domestic cat, may be introduced by the bites of slow lorises, resulting in
anaphylaxis. Thus, it is questionable whether the slow loris should be considered
truly venomous.
Skunks can eject a noxious fluid from glands near their anus. It is not only foul
smelling, but can cause skin irritation and, if it gets in the eyes, temporary
blindness. Some members of the mustelid family, such as the striped polecat
(Ictonyx striatus), also have this capacity to an extent. Pangolins can also emit a
noxious smelling fluid from glands near the anus. The Great Long-nosed Armadillo
can also release a disagreeable musky odor when threatened.

Other venomous animals include:

Toxic birds: Toxic birds produce toxins to defend themselves from predators. No
species of bird is known to actively inject venom, but some birds are known to be
poisonous to touch or eat. These birds usually sequester toxins from animals and
plants that they feed on, commonly from poisonous insects. The pitohui, the ifrita,
and the Rufous or Little Shrikethrush sequester batrachotoxin in their skin and
feathers. The African Spur-winged Goose is toxic to eat as it sequesters poison in its
tissues from the blister beetles that it feeds on. Common Quail are also known to be
toxic to eat around the time of certain migrations.
Toxicofera (Greek for “those who bear toxins”), is a hypothetical clade which represents
about 4600 species (nearly 60%) of extant squamates (scaled lizards.) It
encompasses all venomous reptile species, as well as numerous related non-
venomous species. Toxicofera would combine the following groups from traditional
classification:

Suborder Serpentes (snakes)

Suborder Iguania (iguanas, agamid lizards, chameleons, etc.)
Infraorder Anguimorpha, consisting of:
Family Varanidae (monitor lizards)
Family Anguidae (alligator lizards, glass lizards, etc.)
Family Helodermatidae (Gila monster and Mexican beaded lizard)
 Hallucinogenic fish and venomous fish: Venomous fish are fish that produce venom.
There are at least 1200 species of venomous fish, and they include the Stonefish,
Lionfish, Scorpion Fish, Stargazer, and Toadfish (Daector and Thalassophryne).
Ichthyoallyeinotoxism, or hallucinogenic fish poisoning, comes from eating certain
species of fish found in several parts of the tropics, notably the Indian Pacific. The
effects of eating ichthyoallyeinotoxic fishes are reputed to be similar in some
aspects to LSD. Experiences may include vivid auditory and visual hallucinations.
This has given rise to the collective common name “dream fish” for
ichthyoallyeinotoxic fish. The species most commonly claimed to be capable of
producing this kind of toxicity include several species from the Kyphosus genus,
including Kyphosus fuscus, K. cinerascens and K. vaigiensis. It is unclear whether
the toxins are produced by the fish themselves or by marine algae in their diet, but a
dietary origin may be more likely.

As far as venomous and toxic invertebrates go, it might almost be more appropriate to ask
which aren’t toxic than which are. Countless spiders, insects, other terrestrial invertebrates, and
myriad marine invertebrates either have venomous bites or are toxic to eat or brush against, and
all of them are ruled by Pisces (the marine versions doubly so).
Ancient, long-extinct life-forms: in most cases, we simply don’t know which extinct
animals were venomous or toxic. We can make a reasonable guess as to some of them, for
example, spiders, as well as relatives of extant modern families of insects which are clearly
venomous or toxic, such as ants, bees, wasps, etc.
Other paleobiological candidates include, e.g., therocephalians. They are an extinct
suborder of carnivorous eutheriodont therapsids that lived from the middle and late Permian into
the Triassic (265.0 – 245.0 Ma), existing for approximately 20 million years. The
therocephalians (“beast-heads”) are named after their large skulls, which, along with the
structure of their teeth, suggest that they were successful carnivores. Like other non-mammalian
synapsids, therocephalians are described as mammal-like reptiles, although In fact,
Therocephalia is the group most closely related to the cynodonts, which gave rise to the
mammals. This relationship takes evidence in a variety of anatomical features, possibly including
whiskers and hair. There remain many unanswered questions about the phylogeny, anatomy, and
physiology of therocephalians. The fossils of therocephalians are numerous in the Karoo of
South Africa, but have also been found in Russia, China, and Antarctica. Early therocephalian
fossils discovered in Middle Permian deposits of South Africa support a Gondwanan origin for
the group, which seems to have spread quickly throughout the world. Although almost every
therocephalian lineage ended during the great Permian–Triassic extinction event, 251 million
years ago, a few representatives of the subgroup called Eutherocephalia survived into the Early
Triassic and continued to diversify. However, the last therocephalians became extinct by the early
Middle Triassic, possibly due to climate change and competition with cynodonts and various
groups of reptiles. Although the existence of a venom gland in these animals is controversial, the
absence of postcanine teeth in association with a maxillary pit and grooved caniniform teeth
indicate that a venom delivery apparatus may have existed in some therocephalian therapsids
(e.g., Euchambersia).

*Liber 777, Column XXXVIII.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

Creatures in general:

All members of Kingdom Fungi. Above all, Psilocybin mushrooms and some of the
Amanita mushrooms, which contain alkaloids that can produce visions, dreams, trances,
etc., should be included here. Psilocybin mushrooms, a.k.a. “magic mushrooms,”
 teónanácatl, teotlaquilnanácatl, and xochinanácatl, are fungi that contain the medicinal
compounds psilocybin and psilocin. There are multiple colloquial terms for psilocybin
mushrooms, the most common being magic mushrooms or “shrooms.” Biological genera
containing psilocybin mushrooms include Agrocybe, Conocybe, Copelandia, Galerina,
Gerronema, Gymnopilus, Hypholoma, Inocybe, Mycena, Panaeolus, Pluteus, Psilocybe and
Weraroa. There are approximately 190 species of psilocybin mushrooms and most of them
fall in the genus Psilocybe. Of those Amanita mushrooms that can be used for similar
purposes, they are toxic in larger doses, and the line between the dose that gives visions and
that which kills is very thin even in these species, for which reason those not knowledgeable
about them – and even those that are, in most cases – are well-advised not to ingest any of
them.

Foods, drugs, flavors, and perfumes:

Clothing, Magickal Weapons, and other things, objects, and processes:

Things/commodities/products:

The body:

Diseases:

Psychology:

Magickal image:

Forms, shapes, lineal figures, geomantic figures, figures related to pure number, and
numerological associations:

Magick Square:

Figures related to pure number, other mathematical entities:

Domain:

Archangel:

Point of the compass:

Buddhist symbolism:

Occupations, businesses, and ecological niches:

Places, nations, and peoples:

Peoples: Oceanic peoples, e.g., Polynesians, Melanesians, Micronesians

Places: Oceania (sometimes Oceanica), a geographical, and often geopolitical, region
consisting of numerous lands – mostly islands in the Pacific Ocean and vicinity. The term
“Oceania” was coined in 1831 by French explorer Dumont d’Urville. The term is also
 sometimes used to denote a continent comprising Australia Continent and proximate Pacific
islands, and is one of eight terrestrial ecozones.* It includes the Hawaiian Islands, New
Zealand, Tahiti, the Cook Islands, Papua New Guinea (the Independent State of Papua New
Guinea), Australia, Fiji, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Nauru (the
Republic of Nauru), Kiribati (the Republic of Kiribati), Palau (the Republic of Palau), Samoa
(the Independent State of Samoa), the Solomon Islands, Tonga (the Kingdom of Tonga),
Tuvalu, Vanuatu, American Samoa, Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Baker Island, Clipperton
Island, Cook Islands, Coral Sea Islands, Easter Island, French Polynesia, Guam, Howland
Island, Jarvis Island, Johnston Atoll, Juan Fernández Islands, Kingman Reef, Midway Atoll,
New Caledonia, Niue, Norfolk Island, Northern Mariana Islands, Palmyra Atoll, Pitcairn
Islands, Tokelau, Wake Island, and Wallis and Futuna (this last an overseas collectivity of
France).

*An ecozone or biogeographic realm is the largest scale biogeographic division of the Earth’s land
surfaces, based on the historic and evolutionary distribution patterns of terrestrial plants and animals.
Ecozones represent large areas of the Earth’s surface where plants and animals developed in relative
isolation over long periods of time, and are separated from one another by geologic features, such as
oceans, broad deserts, or high mountain ranges, that formed barriers to plant and animal migration.
Ecozones correspond to the floristic kingdoms of botany or zoogeographic regions of mammal
zoology. Simply they are a definition of the plants and animals in a region further divided by the land
form region. (Example the taiga ecozone in Canada is divided into the taiga plains, and taiga shield.)
Ecozones are characterized by the evolutionary history of the plants and animals they contain. As
such, they are distinct from biomes, also known as major habitat types, which are divisions of the
Earth’s surface based on life form, or the adaptation of plants and animals to climatic, soil, and other
conditions. Biomes are characterized by similar climax vegetation. Each ecozone may include a
number of different biomes. A tropical moist broadleaf forest in Central America, for example, may
be similar to one in New Guinea in its vegetation type and structure, climate, soils, etc., but these
forests are inhabited by plants and animals with very different evolutionary histories.
The patterns of plant and animal distribution in the world’s ecozones was shaped by the process
of plate tectonics, which has redistributed the world’s land masses over geological history.
The term ecozone, as used here, is a fairly recent development, and other terms, including
kingdom, realm, and region, are used by other authorities to denote the same meaning. In some older
works, continent is used, which leads to confusion with the geographic/geologic continents. J. Schultz
uses the term “ecozone” to refer his classification system of biomes.

Matters of the horoscope:

Poetry:

Graphic arts:

Books and other literary productions:

Films:

Saints and exemplars:

American emblems, sigils, symbols, folklore, and urban legend:

Far Eastern cosmological associations:

Trigram from the I Ching:

b. Design and Title of Trump

Gringonneur Tarot:

Bembo:

Swiss:

Insight:

Marseille:

Italian:

Wirth:

Waite:

B.O.T.A.:

Aquarian:

Crowley:

New:

America’s Tarot: The Moon. Upright: J. Edgar Hoover, Harry Anslinger, Al Capone. Background
(ghost): mushroom cloud. Reverse: Hollywood and a montage of famous film-stars; the
martyred John F. Kennedy.

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Spy vs. Spy bat at the Moon above a pool wherein crawls a crab with
markings on its back that form Alfred’s face.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

c. Divinatory Meanings
Case:
Christian:

Crowley:

Douglas:

Gray:

Golden Dawn:

Grimaud:

Huson:

Kahn:

Kaplan:

Knight:

Lind:

Mathers:

Mayananda:

Papus:

Sadhu:

Thierens:

Ussher:

Waite:

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot:

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

General meanings:

d. Interrelationships of the Path and the Trump

 20. Key 30
Resh r, “Head.” Trump XIX, The Sun. Sol Ö. Cardinal value, 200; ordinal value, 20. Connects
Sephirah 8, Hod, with Sephirah 9, Yesod. Roman/English equivalent: R.

a. Qaballistic Meanings and Theory

The thirtieth Path is the Collective Intelligence. It is associated with the astrological judgment of the
stars and celestial signs. This is a Path of enlightenment. The Hebrew letter means the Head, implying
intelligence, while the Yetziratic Text emphasizes the perfection of scientific study and practice. (Here,
astrology may be taken to represent all sciences, for the aim of all sciences, as with astrology, is the
formulation of laws by which predictions of future occurrences may be made. Our man’s technological
evolution is based on exactly that, the formulation of laws in order to predict the operation of cause and
effect in the physical, objective universe.)*

*Unfortunately, astrology, once considered a science, now has the name of “quackery,” thanks to the
tireless efforts of the idiots and frauds who perpetrate rank stupidity and fraudulent claims in the
name of a once-noble discipline. When done the way it’s supposed to be, however, astrology is
practiced scientifically; dedicated astrologers who know what they are doing and do astrology
honestly keep files full of data on the matters for which their charts have been erected and assiduously
pursue research to determine what astrological configurations are most strongly associated with given
types of events and personalities in the real world? But even more unfortunately, the mainstream
media pay no attention to the latter group, only dealing with those who make outlandish, even
sensationalistic claims about astrology, running “daily horoscope” columns that don’t predict worth a
damn, and making people who have a serious interest in astrology look stupid.

There is also the operation of forces on higher planes, as yet little understood by science, the effects of
which eventually manifest in the physical universe. Hence the reference here to astrology is appropriate,
referring not to the largely superstitious newspaper type of “astrology,” but rather to the “starry wisdom”
of the spiritual realms, the interaction of the great Logoi or Gods whose vehicles of physical manifestation
are made manifest in the heavenly bodies. The Sun represents our own Solar Logos, Who is omnipotent
as far as the Solar System is concerned. The forces attributed to the Zodiacal signs are not so much
emanations to Earth of the constellations themselves, but are markers on a great clock which serve to
indicate the type of force emanating from the Solar Logos at any particular time.
The term Collective Intelligence is a useful name for the influence of this Path for in its ultimate
sense it implies knowledge of the whole range of forces, which, on every level, are synthesized into
knowledge.
Resh leads from Yesod to Hod, connecting the Vision of the Machinery of the Universe with the
Vision of Splendor. Hod is rooted in Chesed, the Sephirah of the Vision of Love.* Thus the sunny aspect
of this Path stems largely from the realization of the Divine Love and Splendor which motivates the lower
planes of manifestation which in themselves are known as the Machinery of the Universe, the etheric
structures of Yesod.

*Chesed, the Path connecting Hod with Tiphareth, is associated with the astrological sign Cancer, which
is traditionally considered to be ruled by Luna. But as it is the first month of astrological and
astronomical Summer, when the heat of the Sun finally begins to raise temperatures well above those
of much cooler Spring weather, it is also ruled by the Sun, whose life-giving energies are so in
harmony with this astrological month. For similar reasons, Luna co-rules Leo, which is traditionally
ruled by the Sun.
 Hod is the Sephirah of Hermes, the Divine Messenger, Who is Lord of Books and of Learning, and
also of the Archangel Michael, who disperses the forces of darkness. 44 All this is part of the human mind
and of the vertebrate mind in general. The flowering of rational thought after the Dark Ages, the time
when barbarity and superstition stalked the land, is appropriately called the Age of Enlightenment.
But there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. When the Sun shines without any mitigation
of its heat by clouds and rain, life withers and dies. The unremitting and unbalanced glare of reason has a
similar effect on the mind and body, and everything around them. The pendulum swings to and fro like
night and day or Summer and Winter alternate, and the gross materialism of the nineteenth century, the
effects of which persist to this day, represents reason gone beyond its due limits. When such is the case, it
isn’t the life-giving Sun of the 30 th Path that holds sway over the world, but rather the life-enchaining
Devil of the 26thPath.*

*On the level of neurobiology, neuropsychology, and neurobehavior, this has been amply confirmed by
current research. See, e.g., Oliver Sacks, An Anthropologist on Mars: Seven Paradoxical Tales
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), passim; Antonio R. Damasio, Descartes’ Error: Emotion,
Reason, and the Human Brain (New York: A Grosset/Putnam Book, 1994), passim; and Richard E.
Cytowic, M.D., The Man Who Tasted Shapes: A Bizarre Medical Mystery Offers Revolutionary
Insights into Emotions, Reasoning, and Consciousness (New York: Jeremy Tarcher/Putnam Books,
1993), passim. The “30 years that shook physics,” the first few decades of the 20 th century, during
which a fantastic revolution in the discipline took place, when particle physics first came into its own,
the Special and General Theories of Relativity were postulated and proved out, and the older,
dependable models of mechanics and optics were shown to be inadequate to explain many of the
workings of the cosmos at large, only came about because people were able to cast off the chains of
the hidebound “clockwork universe” mentality of the 19 th century. Steampunk technology and science
are all very well, but when it comes to truly understanding the universe we live in and developing
advanced technologies that will aid in the quest for such understanding and finally give Earthly life
the stars, that sort of mechanical understanding of mind and body had to go. At the dawn of the 20 th
century, when we stepped off the 26th Path and onto the 30th, it did.

This Path is also the polar opposite of the 28 th Path, which links Yesod to Netzach. It has enormous
potential – but also weaknesses brought about by human misuse. Someone who is emotionally caught up
in factors having to do with an unbalance of the 28 th Path is usually urged to “use his reason,” which is, in
effect, an appeal to get his subjective Tree of Life balanced up within himself. The differences in the
effects of the two Paths, the 28 th and the 30th, has to do with that between thought and feeling, which are
opposites in nature. Thus concentrated working upon one or other of the Paths should, in a normal
person, bring about a balancing up of the psyche, or an integration process.
Just as an imbalance of the forces of the 28 th Path creates a “glamour” that misleads the emotions and
causes one to go astray, so does an unbalance of the 30 th Path lead to spiritual and emotional aridity.
However, Trump XIX, The Sun, whose title is Lord of the Fire of the World (or Divine Reason), shows the
true powers of this Path, as symbolized by the Sun showering golden rain upon two near-naked children,
representing the outpouring of the forces of life, light, and love upon young humans. The wall shown on
the Trump signifies an enclosure, the protective limitation, and cultivated plants within a garden, which is
sealed off from wild nature. This has implications on a cosmic level, for only by limitation can growth be
attained.
Moreover, the 30th Path, the Path from Yesod, the unconscious mind, to Hod, the conscious intellect,
is one on which great wisdom can be attained. Hod is the means of contact with great teachers, whose
main sphere of influence is in Chesed. The strong link between Chesed and Hod means that teaching
from these high sources is projected down the planes to form a pool of teaching in Hod.
Thus Resh is the start of the great hermetic Key, the path of Wisdom, which leads via the 26 th Path to
Tiphareth.
But Hod is no more a Sephirah only of barren intellectual activity than Netzach is of weak
sentimentality. Just as there is the lithe, hard splendor and power of the 28 th Path, so the expanding of
consciousness is the light of pure reason on the 30 th Path. Resh is essentially a Path of light – sunlight –
the light of the whole concourse of Solar Logoi throughout Creation, hence the phrase Light in Extension.
There is a further range of powers upon this Path, suggested by the Magical image of Hod: the
Hermaphrodite. Resh is on a direct line with the course of the Lightning Flash of energy from Kether to
Malkuth, whose glyph shows the order of the increasingly denser manifestation of the Spirit. Resh
represents the stage at which the differentiation of the sexes comes about.
The main cause of suffering within the individual is the gulf within himself. The widening chasm
between vision and reality produces insatiate, nameless desire within him.
Many still refuse to incarnate fully by hedging themselves about with a protective barrier of mental
defenses and avoiding experience with life. Because many such are naturally attracted to the sciences,
and the scientist has become a figure of power, this is a cause for concern. Such individuals are quite
capable of destroying or experimenting with life for the sake of a theory, and enabled in this by their self-
imposed deadening of their own emotional lives. And when such Spirits choose for their sphere of
interest politics or warfare then, with the means of destruction now available, humanity had better
beware.*

*A point well-taken, and one which we would do better in today’s high-tech, high-energy world to keep
well in mind. See Roger Shattuck, Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography (New
York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996) on the perils of taking too lightly the power and influence of the
Word. One outstanding exemplar of the end-point of that emotional deadening was Dr. Josef
Mengele, a.k.a. the Angel of Death of Auschwitz, a medical doctor who performed hideous
experiments on living men, women, and children consigned to the camp and given over to Mengele’s
tender mercies simply because they were Jews. It can be argued that Mengele was probably born a
sociopath and therefore never developed those aspects of the brain and personality that would have
kept him from perpetrating such horrendous evil, and that the apparent deadening of affect necessary
for someone to embark on the life-path he did so enthusiastically was not at issue, for the neurological
underpinnings necessary to the complete development of empathy, conscience, and true social
awareness simply didn’t develop in him. Perhaps we might then consider that the over-dependence
on narrow intellect and rejection and starvation of emotion by the 19 th-century intellectual elite might
have come about because at least some members of that elite were, like Mengele, born without the
neurological resources required to fully develop as a social being.

The Sun of the 30th Path can throw a blazing-hot light on the deviations within the self as they
manifest in the personality. The sword and spear of the Archangel Michael are not just symbolic weapons
for use against medieval pantomime demons, but points of accusation and cauterization directed at the
inmost heart of whoever treads this Path on its deeper levels. The Qlippoth need no mighty conjurations,
they are embedded deeply in us, inextricably entwined around the core of our being. Clearly Hod should
be right where it is, at the base of the Pillar of Severity. Resh is a Path of great light, but that light may be
real more of the self and the soul that the seeker finds comfortable.

The astronomical and physical reality of Sol

So what is the Sun?

In the world’s religions, Sol has a prominence rivaled only by Luna. Even in cases in which a
religion incorporates Lunar elements to any significant degree, her importance isn’t always greater than
or even as great as his.* In particular, Christianity is a Solar religion. So was Zoroastrianism. The
Egyptian cult of Ra is another example of a religion based upon worship of the Sun. As for religions either
based upon worship of Luna as chief deity, as is true of many versions of nature religions such as Wicca,
or incorporating a number of Lunar elements, such as the Lunar calendars of Judaism and Islam, all take
Sol into account as central to life.

*It might be more appropriate to refer to Sol as “she” rather than “he.” All Earth’s life, including
ourselves, feeds on Sol’s endless, selflessly provided, and divinely generous bounty as a child does at
its mother’s breast. Indeed, in The Book of Thoth, the Tarot pack designed by Aleister Crowley and
painted by Lady Frieda Harris, the illustration for Trump XIX, The Sun, hints at just that.
 This is unavoidable, considering that without Sol our world would be lifeless – and in fact wouldn’t
have come into existence in the first place. From its conception as part of Eurynome, the same furiously
incandescent nebula of gas and dust which also gave birth to the Sun,* all down through the vast ranges
of geological time to the present day our world has taken Her life from Sol. The Sun’s light, falling upon
the young Earth’s nascent atmosphere and oceans, provided them with the energy necessary to generate
the ultimate biophysical spark that gave life to our world. From then on, most of Earth’s life has fed off
sunlight, either directly, as in the case of cyanobacteria and green plants, or indirectly, as in the case of
the animals that eat green plants, the animals that in turn prey on the herbivores, and the scavengers that
are nourished upon the dead bodies of plants and animals alike.

* The Pelasgian Greek creation story teaches that in the beginning was Chaos, Night, and the Abyss.
From Chaos was born Eurynome, Goddess of All Things. Rising naked out of the Abyss, Eurynome
found nothing substantial for Her feet to rest upon, so She divided the sea from the sky, and danced
all alone across the waves of the sea for untold Aeons. As She danced toward the South, the wind set
in motion in Her wake seemed to Her to be something new, separate from Herself, suitable as raw
material for the construction of a work of creation. Wheeling about, She caught hold of this North
wind, rubbed it between Her hands, and thereby created the great serpent Ophion. As She danced to
warm Herself with ever-increasing wildness, Ophion, watching Her, grew lustful and finally threw
Himself upon Her, coiling Himself about Her divine limbs, and coupled with Her. Now the North
Wind, Whose name is Boreas, is fertile, which is why mares often turn their hindquarters to the wind,
thereby breeding foals without the aid of a stallion. So Eurynome, coupling with an avatar of that
same North wind, likewise became pregnant. Assuming the form of a dove brooding on the waves,
eventually She laid the Universal Egg. At Her bidding, Ophion coiled seven times around this egg,
until it hatched and split in two. Out tumbled everything in existence, Her children: Sun, Moon,
Planets, Stars, the Earth with Her mountains and rivers, trees, herbs, and all other forms of life.
Eurynome and Ophion made Their home upon Mount Olympus. Eventually She created the seven
Planetary powers, setting a Titaness and a Titan over each. But the first man was Pelasgus, ancestor
of the Pelasgians; he sprang from the soil of Arcadia, followed by others whom he taught to make
huts, feed upon acorns and sew pig-skin tunics. Thus the name of this just-so story. It seems fitting
to call that nebula out of which were born Sol and His family of worlds Eurynome, after the Goddess
of Everything in this story; at least as far as we and our world are concerned, that nebula did give
birth to everything important to us and our existence. (As for Ophion, perhaps He might have been a
nearby supernova whose shock-waves triggered collapse of that planetary nebula, thereby giving birth
to Sol and His Planets; the gravitational and electromagnetic fields of the origin of that catastrophic
stellar suicide might have had an effect on the collapsed nebula’s subsequent evolution something like
that of Ophion’s coils on the World-Egg laid by Eurynome. The interested reader might wish to
explore this analogy further, for Magickal, scholarly, or other purposes. For more on the Pelasgian
creation story, see Robert Graves, The Greek Myths (New York: Penguin Books, 1960), Volume I,
Chapter 1, pp. 27-30.

All other bodies in the Solar System represent aspects of the Solar Spirit. Luna is His Mirror, His
Reflection, as the sensitive, receptive, reaction Soul that is Her domain reflects the Willful mutations and
evolutions of Spirit. Mercury represents Sol’s Energy, as this is translated into Thought and Work.
Venus expresses the infinite Fertility engendered by Him, the endless capacity for Life which He
nourishes. Mars represents Sol’s Will and Self-Assertion. Jupiter is the vehicle of His relations with the
other, mighty, incandescent beings of the stellar societies of Heaven. Saturn represents the limits on His
Being, on His Individuation out of the original stuff of the World Egg that gave rise to everything.
Uranus is the avatar of His Transcendence of those same limits; Neptune represents His Psyche, His
connections to the universal Collective Unconscious; and Pluto is the vessel of the Power of His Spirit,
His Will.
In the microcosm, every living organism is one of His avatars, its individual spirit, soul, mind, body,
and behavior all expressions of His being and nature. As the Planets are macrocosmic representations and
avatars of the various aspects of His existence and evolution, so are the traits of individual organisms,
each with its Planetary ruler, representations in the microcosm of these same Solar characteristics.
Over a million kilometers in diameter, so big that a million worlds the size of Earth could easily fit
into His vast volume, every second the Sun emits 3.86 x 10 26 joules – 3.86 million million kilowatts – of
electromagnetic power, which is continuously radiated away into space. His mighty heart is 113,475
times as dense as water,* having a temperature of 15 million degrees Kelvin (27 million degrees
Fahrenheit); even the average temperature of His surface, the Solar photosphere, is around 6,050 degrees
K (5,777º C or 10,400º F). His average density is 1.4 times that of water; His mass is 1.981 x 10 30
kilograms, more than a third of a million times that of Earth.

*The density of water, the standard measurement of density for all materials, is one gram of mass per
cubic centimeter.

As observed from Earth, the rotation of His equator about His axis takes 26.8 days; at successively
higher latitudes, His rotation period is longer, so that, for example, at Solar latitude 75 degrees, the
rotation period is 31.8 days.* His physical composition is about 73% hydrogen and 25% helium, the rest
consisting, in descending order of their contribution to Sol’s mass, of oxygen, carbon, iron, neon,
nitrogen, silicon, magnesium, and sulfur, as well as a number of other elements present only in trace
quantities. Sol’s surface is often violently active, and at any time displays a number of distinctive
features. The latter include sunspots, which have a magnetic field-strength of up to 3,000 Gauss and a
typical temperature of 5,000-6,000 degrees Kelvin; bright granules and granular networks, the granules
themselves being polygonal in shape and separated by dark lines; and prominences, enormous fiery
eruptions large enough to consume many Planets the size of Earth.

*Thus the average rotational period of a point on the Sun’s surface is about 28 days. Only recently has
it been determined that the sidereal period of the Solar core’s rotation is 22.8 days – in other words,
about 23 days. From long before the beginning of written history, human beings have been well
aware that the mature human female has a biological cycle equal in length to the sidereal period of
revolution of Luna around the Earth, which is 28 days – coincidentally, the same as the average
rotational period of the Solar surface. But there is also an analogous biological cycle of 23 days in the
human male, a phenomenon noted by Sigmund Freud and his colleagues, among others. Clearly the
female menstrual cycle is timed according to Luna’s sidereal period of revolution around the Earth –
but what timing mechanism is responsible for the 23-day male biorhythm? Now it seems that the
sidereal rotation of the Solar core, the period of which was determined in the late 1970s, may be the
timing “gear” for the male cycle.
From the far, forgotten reaches of human prehistory, the Moon has symbolized Woman, as the
Sun has symbolized Man. It was always clear to us that the lives of women are geared to the cycles of
Luna as She passes across the backdrop of the Starry Heavens. Now it seems that deep in our
biorhythms, as these are tied to the Sun, there may be a basis for the symbolic link in the human
psyche between the Sun and the male human being. Here also may be a natural basis for the
psychospiritual power of the number 23, upon which modern Discordian religion is based, a power as
great as that of 2, 7, and other numbers which we have always associated with sacred and esoteric
things.
(For many years, from 1978 until about 1991, the author’s own menstrual cycles were 23 days
long, as regular as clockwork. As it happens, my own natal Sun stands at 0° 3’ Aries, in mutual
reception with Pluto – Luna’s higher octave in the heliocentric system of astrology [see Volume 1,
Part 2 of this work for more thereon] – in Leo. Somehow, apparently my body’s biological clock
became unhitched from the Moon and geared instead to the Sun and Pluto for some 14 years [which,
incidentally, is the length of time it takes Saturn to go through about half the Zodiac, Uranus to go
through two Signs, and Neptune to go through one Sign]. Was it the sidereal rotation of the Solar
core to which my menstrual cycle became re-geared?)
 That portion of Sol’s light that is visible to our eyes is only a tiny fraction of His vast output. Sol
emits radiation of all types, from gamma radiation, with a frequency of up to 10 15 megahertz*, all the way
to radio emissions, with frequencies of less than 10 3 MHz (with wavelengths longer than a meter). By
contrast, the visible light emitted by Sol has wavelengths ranging from about 3800-7300 angstroms (an
angstrom is equal to 10 -10 meters), corresponding to some 108 MHz. But Gaia, the biosphere of our Planet,
lets only a very small portion of the energy She receives from Sol at the top of Her atmosphere reach Her
land and water surface, namely the visible light She receives from Him together with some of His
radiation in the high infra-red and low ultra-violet ranges. Most frequencies of Sol’s radiant energy
received by our Planet are so potent, and so potentially deadly to life, that Gaia wisely screens out almost
all of His overwhelming luminescent bounty, letting only that tiny range of frequencies ranging from the
high infrared to the low ultraviolet through to Her surface. She screens out all other frequencies, which
otherwise would make Earthly life as we know it impossible. The Solar Constant, the amount of energy of
all wavelengths received per second from Sol at the top of Earth’s atmosphere is about 1.37 kW per
square meter. About 99% of it consists of light in the visible and near-visible ranges of the spectrum,
constant to about 1 per cent, radio and X-ray light contributing insignificantly to the total, quantitatively
speaking. Earth’s atmosphere has no trouble screening out that part of Sol’s light which would be
definitely harmful to living organisms.** The albedo of the Earth – the amount of Solar radiation which
Her atmosphere reflects back into space rather than transmitting it down to Earth’s surface – is about
40%, so about 60% of the Solar radiation Earth receives at the top of Her atmosphere is transmitted to the
ground. It is that light that nourishes all Earth’s life – indeed, which generated it in the first place.

*One megahertz is equal to 1,000 cycles per second (cps). 10 15 is thus 1,000 million million million
cycles per second, equivalent to a wavelength of less than a hundredth of an angstrom.

**Or at least this was so up until the advent of PCPs and other ozone-destroying compounds in the last
few decades. This now may be no longer the case, at least in those parts of the Earth where gigantic
ozone holes exist for part of the year, places where the ozone levels of the upper layers of our
atmosphere drop to virtually nothing for increasingly longer fractions of each year due to destruction
of atmospheric ozone by chemicals such as PCP. If this isn’t remedied soon, all Earth’s surface life,
ourselves included, may soon be in very serious trouble.

It is now thought that the Sun began life as an enormous, collapsing cloud of gas. As this
incandescent gas-cloud shrank in size, contracting under the ruthless grip of its own gravitational field,
becoming denser and denser, its temperature rose until a self-sustaining thermonuclear fusion reaction –
the Solar Phoenix – ignited at its core. With the ignition of this self-sustaining fusion cycle Sol Himself
was born.*

*The traditional exaltation of Sol is in the Sign Aries, the first third of Solar Spring, the Sign of Birth and
Resurrection, when the ancient fertility festival which we now call Easter takes place. Fittingly,
Pluto, Who represents thermonuclear reactions in general and the Solar Phoenix in particular, is the
diurnal mundane Lord of Aries. (Incidentally, The ancient Anglo-Saxon name for this same festival,
“Eastor,” came from the name of the Goddess of the Dawn, the hour of Sol’s exaltation, Who also
gave Her name to the Eastern Quarter of the compass. We still celebrate this festival, by essentially
the same name they did, albeit in very different ways than was their custom; our word “Easter” is
also collaterally related to “oyster” and “oestrus.” [According to the Norse Eddas, Eastor’s consort
was Austri or Austro, God or Spirit of Light. Our word “austral,” referring to the South, comes from
that God’s name. So does the German world Ostern, which, however, refers to the Eastern rather
than the Southern Quarter.] )

At the time of Sol’s birth, His bulk consisted almost entirely of hydrogen gas, save for insignificant
traces of various other elements left over from the catastrophic stellar suicides of gigantic, older Stars
Whose remains, thrown out from the supernovae that ended Their lives, provided the raw material out of
which Sol first evolved. But as billions of years passed, more and more of His hydrogen was converted via
the Solar Phoenix reaction into helium, with radiant energy produced as a by-product of that reaction.
Now, five to ten billion years after Sol’s birth, this helium “ash” constitutes about one-quarter of His
mass.
As Sol ages, he also heats up. Eventually, when h has used up most of his store of hydrogen, He will
leave the Main Sequence, evolving into a red giant.* What this means is that once he has exhausted all
his hydrogen, using it up in the process of generation of thermonuclear energy that constitutes His living
metabolism, He will then begin “burning” helium by means of a similar process, but now at a much
higher temperature than during His hydrogen-burning phase, expanding as His temperature rises until He
becomes far larger than before, increasing in size until His radius is greater than that of the orbit of
Mercury, Who will have been engulfed and consumed by Him by that time. His surface temperature per
square meter of His surface will drop as He expands in this way, but by then His surface will be so vast,
the thermonuclear fires of the burning of helium within Him so hot, that the total radiation from His
surface will be far greater than it was before He exhausted His stores of hydrogen.

8
The Main Sequence is the name given by astrophysicists to the evolutionary sequence through which
most Stars pass during Their middle years, as plotted by temperature/spectral type versus
luminosity/absolute visual magnitude in the Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram, a plot of the absolute
magnitude of stars against their spectral class. Equivalently, a plot of the luminosity of stars against
their surface temperature.
In the early 1900s, Ejnar Hertzsprung in Denmark and Henry Norris Russell in the United States
independently began to consider how the brightness of stars might be related to their spectra. In
1911, Hertzsprung plotted the apparent magnitudes of stars in several clusters against their spectral
class. In 1913, Russell plotted the absolute magnitudes of stars in the solar neighborhood against
their spectral class. Both astronomers were quick to emphasize the non-random patterns they saw in
the arrangement of the data on these graphs. Such graphs have become extremely important in
modern astronomy and are today called Hertzsprung-Russell diagrams.
A Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, or H-R diagram, is any graph on which a parameter measuring
stellar brightness is plotted against a parameter related to a star’s surface temperature. For example,
the ordinate of the graph may be apparent magnitude, absolute magnitude, absolute bolometric
magnitude, or luminosity, the abscissa spectral class, color index, or surface temperature.
Consider the following two equivalent H-R diagrams, A and B:
A resembles Russell’s original graph. Each dot on it represents a star whose absolute magnitude and
spectral class have been determined from observations. Most of the data lie along a broad line called
the Main Sequence (cv.) that extends diagonally across the diagram. The Sun (absolute magnitude
+5, spectral type G2) is a typical main sequence star. A second prominent grouping of data points
represents very large, cool stars called red giants. In the lower left corner, a third grouping identifies
compact, hot stars called white dwarfs.
An H-R diagram can also be drawn by plotting the luminosity of stars against their surface
temperatures, as shown in diagram B. Notice that temperature increases toward the left. The
spectral classes OBAFGKIM constitute a temperature sequence and the first H-R diagrams were
drawn with the hot O stars on the left and the cool M stars on the right.
These H-R diagrams show that the total range in stellar brightness is 27 magnitudes,
corresponding to a factor of 10 11 in luminosity, and the range in the surface temperature of stars is
from 2,200º K to 50,000º K. The size of a star is related to both its luminosity and its surface
temperature, as indicated by the dashed lines. Most main sequence stars are roughly the same size as
the sun. White dwarfs are about the same size as the Earth, while red giants and supergiants can be
as big as Earth’s orbit around the Sun.
The statistical distribution of data on an H-R diagram demonstrates that stars fainter than the
Sun are far more numerous than those brighter than the Sun. In a given volume in the solar
neighborhood, about 90% of the stars are main sequence stars, about 10% are white dwarfs, and about
1% are red giants or supergiants.
The existence of three main groupings on the H-R diagram means that a typical star passes
through three very different stages during its life. The temperature of a star changes as it evolves,
enabling us to plot the path followed by an evolving star on an H-R diagram.
The evolutionary tracks of contracting protostars show that they change rapidly as gravitational
contraction compresses and heats their cores. When a protostar’s central temperature reaches several
million degrees, hydrogen burning begins, and the evolutionary track stops at the main sequence.
Consequently, main sequence stars are comparatively young, and have hydrogen only recently ignited
burning at their cores.
Pre-main sequence evolutionary tracks deposit new-born stars along the main sequence in
agreement with the mass-luminosity relation (the more massive a star is, the brighter it is). Thus the
main sequence is a sequence in mass, as well as temperature and luminosity. These tracks also show
that the more massive a star is, the more rapidly it evolves.
As a star consumes its store of hydrogen, it gradually brightens and cooler. When its supply of
hydrogen is exhausted, the star’s core contracts, its atmosphere expands, and it becomes a red giant.
Ageing stars spend their final years as bloated red giants.
Massive stars can end their lives with supernova explosions that leave behind neutron stars and
black holes. These are detected at non-visible wavelengths, so the H-R diagram has no relevance to
the post-red giant evolution of massive stars.
A star less massive than about three solar masses can eject as much as half its mass at the end of
its life, producing a planetary nebula, i.e., a halo of gas and dust surrounding the star in question.
The exposed, burnt-out core of the star then contracts to become a white dwarf. Detailed calculations
of this process produce evolutionary tracks that rapidly take low-mass stars from the red giant region
in the upper right of the H-R diagram to the white dwarf region in the lower left.
Stellar evolution calculations relate the H-R diagram to time, so that these graphs can provide
information about the ages of stars. Such age dating is especially applicable to star clusters.
A very young cluster, such as NGC2362, consists primarily of main sequence stars. However,
the more massive a star is, the more rapidly it consumes its core supply of hydrogen and becomes a
red giant. Since the main sequence is a progression in stellar mass, the stars are the upper end of the
main sequence are the first to leave. As the cluster ages, its main sequence “burns down like a
candle” as stars of progressively decreasing mass and luminosity become red giants. For example,
M67 is an old cluster because only those stars less massive and luminous than the Sun still remain on
its main sequence.
Horizontal branch stars, stars aligned along horizontal branches jutting out from the right side of
the H-R diagram, are believed to be low-mass stars that have recently ignited helium in their cores via
the “helium flash” (A theoretically predicted event in the evolution of a lower-mass star. After the
hydrogen in its core has been exhausted and the star has become a red giant, the central temperature
will rise to the point at which helium fusion suddenly begins. It is unlikely that the explosion will
reach the surface of such a star. In a more massive star, helium fusion begins gradually because of
 different conditions in its core). In an asymptotic red giant, helium burning occurs in a thin shell
surrounding the star’s center.
Between the horizontal branch stars and the red giants is a gap. When the evolutionary track of
a low-mass star takes it across this region, the star pulsates as an RR Lyrae variable (RR Lyrae
variables are often called short-period Cepheids or cluster-type variables, which have Cepheid-like
variations in luminosity but with extremely short periods of a fraction of a day. These rapidly
pulsating stars have light curves that differ from the classical Cepheids. Most rise very quickly to
maximum brightness in only a tenth or less of their total period. Their minima are comparatively
prolonged, so that for a few hours their light remains constant. Their spectral types range from A to
F. They are giants; those in our galaxy belong to spherical clusters). This gap is at the lower end of
the so-called instability strip, a vertical region in the middle of the H-R diagram where stars are
unstable against radical oscillations. When a massive star passes through this region, it pulsates, and
is called a Cepheid variable.

Eventually, Sol will use up all his helium, as well. At that point, he will start to collapse again, then
begin burning the by-products of the former helium-burning, elements heavier than helium. This cycle of
exhaustion of one kind of fuel, potential collapse of his core, and re-ignition of thermonuclear burning at
the core using still heavier fuels that are the by-products of earlier stages of thermonuclear burning will
continue on and on, using calcium, then oxygen, then even metals on up through iron as fuel to keep His
core alive with thermonuclear fire. Finally, when nothing more remains which Sol can use as a fuel-
source, by which point He will be a shrunken reddish ghost of His former glory, Sol will die, his burnt-out
corpse becoming a “white dwarf,” a very dead star radiating the last of his revenant heat and light into a
void increasingly less populated with living stars for tens of billions of years or more, until at last he
becomes a “black dwarf,” utterly lightless and cold.
But that ultimate, last, long sleep of our star lies a hundred billion or more years in the future. Long
before then, well before Sol undergoes his dramatic expansion and evolution into a helium-burning red
giant, his temperature will rise until he becomes so hot and bright that life finally becomes impossible on
our world. If we or some future species of Earthly life* has, in the meantime, managed to successfully
transport itself, along with a representative sample of the rest of Earth’s life, to other, more viable ports of
call, then Earth’s – and thus Sol’s – great spirit will live on. But save for the hope of the colonization of
the worlds of other Stars by Earthly life, all of Earth’s burgeoning fertility will have been irrevocably
extinguished by the remorselessly increasing heat and light of Sol long before he uses up his last stores of
hydrogen and evolves into a red giant, let alone dies himself. As far as we are concerned, relative to us,
he is immortal – and the source not only of the sustenance absolutely necessary for our world’s life, but
indeed of her very existence in the first place, as well.**

*Though there may not now be enough time left for another species to arrive that could do the job for our
world. E.g., at any time, floods of deadly radiation from a nearby supernova or the impact of a
gigantic comet on our world of the sort that caused the great mass-extinctions of Earthly life could
create the sort of devastation on our world that ended the Cambrian and much of its life, putting paid
to the dinosaurs, and such things could happen to our world more than once in the future. If they
happened often enough over the next billion years, that would effectively wrap it up for Earth’s
chances of evolving another handy, ingenious firebug of an organism capable of producing the sort of
pan-species, space-going grex needed for Earth’s successful reproduction somewhere out there in the
vast, Starry reaches of the universe.

**Patrick Moore and Garry Hunt, Atlas of the Solar System (New York: Rand McNally and Co., 1983),
pp. 18-75 (Sol and 132-141 (Earth).

In a strictly physical sense – a thermodynamic, quantum mechanical, and ergonomic sense – what we
are, as living beings, are fields of Solar energy. In a generalized sense, we are fields of stellar energy, but
the nucleus of these fields is of course our Sun, the most massive body in the Solar System, the most
massive anywhere near us, far and away the most important star in all the heavens to us. Of course, those
fields are articulated in relatively heavy matter as part of Gaia, our living world, and that is where the
focus of our consciousness normally is. Even so, physical fields extend to infinity, in all dimensions, in
however attenuated a form. So part of our being extends to every particle of matter in the universe, with
secondary foci in the heart of every Star that exists – it may be that every living organism has a true focus
in a Star not our Sun, one Star to each.* But the main body of what each of us is, is concentrated in our
day-Star, and together we all form an interacting three-dimensional, ever-changing dynamic system of
fields of Solar energy embracing and enwrapping our Sun as well as every Planet in the Solar System, all
of which lie within the Sun’s electromagnetic fields (however thin those fields may become out past the
orbit of Saturn, the last of the Classical Planets of Western astrology!). The Gods, the vast Intelligences
associated with the universal processes of the living universe, each also has His or Her or Its expression in
the form of enormous standing-wave systems in the Sun’s envelope and/or core, like ours except for their
gigantic scale and intensity. Each such system is associated with one of the Solar Planets – that one
which in astrology is always associated with that God – according to the gravitational perturbations of the
Sun’s huge fluid body caused by that Planet in its dance about the Sun. Apollo is Sol Himself; Athena is
an expression of the dance of Earth and Moon around Sol; Hades is one of Pluto, deep within the Sun;
Dark Isis, Kali is the hot black heart of Sol, so massive that even light has trouble escaping it. So we and
our Gods are united in our Sun – and in every Star in all the universe. Consciousness and the “material”
body, made of clay, die; but the spirit goes on forever, and its physical expression is in Starlight. Love
entails, among other things, consciousness of this unity and community in the Sun, our kinship as beings
of Sunlight and wave-forms which collectively make up our Sun. As long as there is light, anywhere, we
do not die in the spirit, and we exist in that great Stellar community, perfect awareness of expresses itself
in what the Greeks and Crowley call “Agape.”

*An eerie echo of the declaration in Aleister Crowley’s The Book of the Law that “Every man and every
woman is a star.” The religion based upon The Book of the Law is a Solar religion. Is an awareness
of the nature of our relationship to Sol on an actual physical level embedded in The Book of the Law,
if only on an unconscious level?

In Chaos: Making a New Science,* James Gleick reports that over the last decade or so, medical
science has been able to demonstrate that chaos is the hallmark of a healthy organism. Chaotic patterns,
in the mathematical sense, are the hallmark of, say, the beat of a health heart, the e-m waves in a healthy
brain, and so on. Once chaos leaves and non-chaotic patterns emerge, the organism is on its way toward
death. Thus Eris, Goddess of Chaos and Discord, is the ultimate spirit of Life. Life exists only as long as
She is present; when She leaves, so does Life. She is thus a representative of Sol, Who has the same
relationship to all Earthly life. 12

*James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (New York: Penguin Books , 1988; , ISBN 978-
0140092509).

The Sun is the point at which religion, psychism, Magick, and astrology all converge. Every living
Earthly organism, and all the Gods of Earth, are standing-wave patterns, large and small, in the Sun;
wave-forms can interact and overlap in every possible way and still each be discrete, an entity in its own
right,* and thus, in terms of the physics of the spirit, we are joined together, indestructible, unbounded, in
the ergonomic community that is the Sun, however separate and bounded our bodies and conscious minds
on Earth may be. This is true of all the Gods, as well; so each of us is bound up in all other Beings, and
all Beings in each. What astrology apparently documents is the ever-changing form of interaction of these
standing-wave patterns in the Sun, the dynamics of which is due to the ever-changing gravitational matrix
of the Solar System, a result of the continuous permutations of the geometry of the Solar System due to the
dance of Planets, Moons, asteroids, comets, etc about Sol. The Planets collectively tug and haul on the
Sun’s fluid plasma body in ways that never cease changing, due to that dance; so their geometry at any
given time is an indication of the overall interaction-pattern of the living standing-wave patterns that are
Life at that moment, which have their main physical focus in our Sun. As that geometry changes, so does
that pattern, and thus the forces on any of those physical particles and fields in the Sun associated with
any one living spirit. The so-called “astral planes,” at least their physical expression, are simply those
aspects of our physical being associated with parts of the Solar System removed from Earth, especially our
Sun – or, more remotely, the far Stars. What we are conscious of when in trance-states, or experiencing
ESP, etc., are levels of our being that are literally extra-terrestrial, even interstellar, in this sheerly
physical sense – i.e., our focus of consciousness shifts from its normal locus on Earth to loci farther and
farther removed from Earth. When doing Magick, we work mostly on these extra-terrestrial aspects of
being, but in a very physical sense – a sense which can be elegantly described in terms of thermodynamics
and quantum mechanics. And most of these “planes of being” are, for most psychics, Magickians, etc.,
within the Solar Corona, that Solar Envelope that is Christos-Apollo in all His Glory, though these of
course also reflect both deeper levels of the Sun and extra-Solar/extraterrestrial regions of the fields that
are living Being. So: astrology documents the tugging and hauling of gravity on our Solar bodies, the
envelope of energy, gas, fields that constitutes most of what we are as living beings, which has its major
physical focus in the Sun, and predicts how this will affect that focus of our conscious, mortal lives that
comprises our ego and physical body, as expressed in our behavior, feelings, and the courses of our lives.
Magick is the Art and Science of causing change in conformity with Will by shifting one’s focus of
consciousness Sunward, then, from that point of view, reaching out via one’s Solar body to manipulate
living Being by subtle biophysical techniques (or planetward, or starward, whatever works). Psychics
simply plug into the Solar Internet, the interconnections among all the Solar expressions of Life. So here
comes the Sun, everybody: grab an Apple – whether red, green, one of the golden ones of Eris with
“Καλλιξτι“ written on the side, or one of the rainbow kind that kicked off the PC revolution (and left
Discordianism panting in the dust of its boots when it comes to revolutionary upheavals!) – and let’s GO!

*”– nothing but twinkles. But what twinkles!” – Aleister Crowley, The Confessions of Aleister Crowley,
{809} (http://www.hermetic.com/crowley/confess/chapter82.html).

Astromythology and Psychospiritual Aspects of the Sun

What are the astromythological and psychospiritual aspects of our world’s great blazing primary?
Since time out of mind, Sol has represented wealth to us. Without the Sun, there would be no life, the
basis of wealth and that which gives it meaning. The creation of wealth ultimately rests on the production
of food, and it is sunlight on which that production depends. For that reason, astrologically speaking, the
Sun rules wealth.
On the other hand, Cancer and the Fourth House rule the ultimate sources of all wealth, material and
spiritual: land and ancestry – and, of course, the Sunlight locked up in all forms of life or once-living
things that provides all the energy for all of life’s activities. The Sun is Tiphareth, beauty ; the source
and informing spirit of all beauty is the Great Spirit, the spirit of the living land, Gaia, Mother Earth.
The Sun represents our children, and thus the Earth and all Her wealth, which we have only borrowed for
a little while from the generations yet to come.
As far as the astrology of the Sun goes, Sol in the sign Cancer represents Shiva, the male partner in
Tantric Magick. In Tantric or Sexual Magick, one partner plays a passive role, being stimulated to
orgasm or even kept at a point just before orgasm, without actually climaxing, over a long period of time
by the ministrations of the active, female partner, Kali. (Here, “male” and “female” need not be taken
literally; they represent roles rather than morphology, though usually such rituals involve one man and
one woman, the man taking the passive part of “Shiva,” the woman the active one of “Kali.”) When it is
desired that “Shiva” actually be eventually brought to full climax by “Kali,” in order to attain Samadhi or
union with God at the point of climax (having been primed for this throughout the ritual by means of the
various ritual accompaniment such as music, incense, chants, dancing, etc.), this induces in him a
temporary blackout of the ego or critical mind. Theologically and symbolically this is represented in the
Hindu religion as the Dance of Kali, in which She kills Her consort, Shiva, by cutting off his head –
which represents His temporary loss of critical consciousness – and dancing on his body, representing Her
ecstatic writhing in the throes of orgasm. In these scenarios, She is coal-black, while He is white.
Astrologically, this is linked to the total eclipse of Sun or Moon – especially of the Sun – in which,
temporarily, the disc of the Moon cuts off the light of the Sun, or the bulk of the Earth throws the Moon
into total darkness. This only happens at Full or New Moon, total eclipse of the Moon coming when the
Moon is full, and that of the Sun only at New Moon. Especially in the case of total eclipse of the Sun, the
brilliant light of the eclipsed body just prior to and after eclipse is the critical, “male” mind and ego of
Shiva, the male partner in Tantra, while the dark, eclipsing body is Kali, the yin force that “steals” away
the rational, critical faculties of Her male partner via orgasm, thereby liberating Him from the chains of
“daylight” thinking so that He can then experience Samadhi and His own apotheosis.
Kali and Shiva were both originally Lunar deities of the original Draviddian peoples of the Indian
sub-continent, before the coming of the Aryan peoples that displaced them. Kali represented the Lunar
eclipse, while Shiva represented the eclipsed Moon. Later, with the coming of the Aryans with their Solar
religions, Shiva became as well as Sun-God, but He was still Kali’s consort and complement, just as the
Sun and Moon are two halves of one astrological dyad, co-ruling the same Signs. The Sun in Cancer by
night is Shiva, “eclipsed” by the bulk of the Earth so that He may come into His own as God; the Moon in
Leo is Kali, for She draws Her Kundalini power from the Fire of that Fixed, Kerubic Sign. In Cancer, the
Sun gives up the daylight power He has in Leo in order to gain another kind of power, the power gained
by become perfectly passive, an empty vessel waiting to be filled by the fires of Kundalini evoked by one’s
sexual partner, by which one attains to Godhead through Samadhi. Likewise, in Leo, the Moon gives up
the night-time power which She has in Cancer in order to create Godhood in Her partner via Tantric
ritual, giving up the Power of the Chalice, the passive receptacle to which all things finally come, Womb
and Tomb in one, in order to gain the Power of the Fire-Dagger, the active generation in another of
Godhead via cultivation of sexual ecstasy.
Luna in Leo is the classic representation of Kali’s role in such ritual; Pluto in Leo is the modern-day
symbol for Her in this role, clearly representing Her simultaneously in Her most benign, creative form and
at Her most destructive. But anciently the Moon, as Pluto does today, represented both Womb and Tomb,
and Woman as the vessel of both. Likewise the Sun represented the masculine powers of insemination,
reason, and brute force – Lingam at once both an instrumentality of Life and a means of death, rape, and
destruction. In Cancer, the Sun sets aside His normal, “daylight” aspects of initiative, force, logic, and
control in order to achieve elevation to Godhood via the ministrations of His female side or anima,
represented by Luna in Leo; Luna in Leo, likewise, sets aside Her normal, “night-time” aspects of
passivity, subtlety, seduction, sensitivity, and receptiveness in order to achieve elevation to Godhood via
Her insemination of Her partner, Sol on Cancer, with the Kundalini energy which She evokes during Her
sexual “dance.”
For this reason also Sol rules Cancer by night, just as Luna is the nocturnal ruler of Leo.
Sol’s central biophysical place in our lives is an accurate reflection on the Outer Planes of His
influence upon us on the Inner Planes. The Sun Sign is the most important single factor for interpretation
of a natal horoscope, for it indicates the way the native expresses his or her basic sociobiological,
ecological, and psychospiritual potentials and creative drive to grow and develop as an individual.
According to Robert Hand,

. . . The Sun represents the energy that enables everything else to exist. It is the basic
energy of Being. Just as the physical Sun shines and [thereby] enables all the other
bodies [of the Solar System] to shine by reflecting [His] light, so the symbolic
astrological Sun is the basic energy of which all the other planetary energies are
specialized reflections. *

*
Robert Hand, Horoscope Symbols (Gloucester, MA: Para Research, Inc., 1981), p. 47-50.

Theoretically the Sun’s natal position also indicates the stage of growth represented by the native’s
present incarnation, as well as the “life-lessons” which he or she “must” master before being allowed to
matriculate permanently to a “higher plane” of existence. However, in the authors view, at least, above all
the Sun represents the optimal ecological niche for the native, the one for which he or she was, genetically
and circumstantially, “custom-made” by Nature to fit the needs of Gaia, our living world, at the time of
his or her conception. In this view, the Sun-Sign represents some aspect of Gaia’s metabolism and
physiology in which those individuals having their natal Sun in that Sign are supposed to participate
during their lifetimes, and helps define their ecological fit into Gaia. (In this same view, the other factors
in an organism’s horoscope add refinements and higher- and more thoroughly articulated definition to the
potential ecological fit shown by the placement of that individual’s Sun. These have to do with sub-
systems of sub-systems of the basic physiological and metabolic systems of Gaia associated with the Sun-
Signs.)
 The Sun generates Life; without Him, Gaia would be lifeless and barren. In one form or another, all
cultures recognize this, and give worship to the Solar Light that is Life in ways appropriate to their needs
and drives.* For example, ancient Egypt worshipped the Sun as the greatest of the Gods; Christianity
worships the Solar Light as the Christos. All peoples show, in however indirect a form, their instinctive
understanding that the Sun is Life, the Life of the world and its Lord. In the Northern Hemisphere, at
least, almost all cultures have a Mid-Winter festival, at the time when the Sun’s light and warmth begins
to return to the world and, with it, the world’s life. The Magickal name of the poet William Butler Yeats
reflects this: “Demon est Deus inversus.” For if Satan, or Saturn, is “Lord of this world,” as many sects
of Christianity remind us, it is only in Satan/Saturn’s Sign, Capricorn, that the Solar Light that is the
Christ is rekindled, and only by that Light that Satan/Saturn’s Wintery Power is authorized.

*For example, we sacrilegious, capitalistic Yankees worship the Almighty Dollar, backed up by the gold-
standard. The SubGenii worship J. R. “Bob” Dobbs, a Solar God Who promises that by following His
teachings, much gold – and $lack – is to be had. And the Discordians worship Eris, Whose Weapon
is the Golden Apple. Throughout human history, gold has been considered to be the metal of the
Sun, and things haven’t changed significantly in that respect in modern times.

The Sun is the motivating power behind all action. He is Will and Spirit, and his basic earthly,
outward manifestation is as the Ego. He is Light, Consciousness, and Day. In terms of Chinese
metaphysics, He embodies the essence of the Yang, the intentionality, assertiveness and activity of all life,
on All the Planes of being.

Qaballistic correspondences:

Yetziratic text: The Thirtieth Path is the Collective Intelligence and astrologers deduce from it
the judgment of the stars and celestial signs, and perfect their science according to the rules
of the motions of the stars.

Yetziratic title: The Lord of the Fire of the World.

Hebrew letter: ‫( ר‬Resh), “Head.”

Numerical value:

Astrological assignment: The Sun, which, with the Moon, rules Leo and Cancer; is exalted in
Aries and Taurus; and is the esoteric ruler of Gemini and Pisces. The Lights and Planets
are classified according to “temperament,” which includes such traits as “hot” vs. “cold,”
“dry” vs. “wet,” “diurnal” vs. “nocturnal,” electric, magnetic, and others. Sol’s traits
include: fruitful, benefic (when favorably aspected), diurnal, dry, electric, magnetic, and
masculine.*

*Nicholas de Vore, op. cit., pp. 277-278.

Alchemical and Pythagorean Associations:

Gold (Z = 79) is the traditional metal of the Sun

The Element Air is associated with Sol

Other Magickal Correspondences, according to Barrett,* et. al:

*Francis Barrett. The Magus (a Complete System of Occult Philosophy) ( Secaucus, NJ: Citadel Press,
1967. Reprint of original work copyright 1967 by University Press; originally published in London
by Lackington, Allen & Co., 1801.

Day of the Week ruled by Sol:

Geocentric: Sunday (first day of the week)

Heliocentric: Second day of the week

Hours of the Day ruled by Sol:

Geocentric: The first, eighth, and fifteenth 60-minute periods after dawn of the first day of
the week; also, traditionally, the third, tenth, and seventeenth 60 minutes periods after
sunset of that day. In all cases, the hour preceding the hour ruled by Venus, and
following that ruled by Mars.

Heliocentric: The first, eighth, and fifteenth 60-minute periods after dawn of the second day
of the week; and the third, tenth, and seventeenth 60 minutes periods after sunset of
that day. In all cases, the hour preceding that ruled by Saturn, and following that ruled
by Mercury.

Grade of the Temple:

Fifth Degree = Sixth Grade, Adeptus Minor (first [lowest] Grade of Second Order)

Planetary Age of Man:

There are several schools which teach that the life-span of the individual is divided into
distinct periods, each ruled by its own Planet. According to the Chaldeans and others, Sol
rules the Fourth period of life, a time of great virility for men and fertility for women,
representing one’s most active And healthy years, the prime of life. If the life-span of a
human being is the Biblical “three-score and ten” or 70 years, and if only the traditional
seven Planets – the Sun, Luna, and the Planets Mercury through Saturn – are considered,
then this fourth Age of Man comprises the years 31-40, assuming each such period to be
one-seventh the total number of years in a person’s life.
For the ideal length of life we could use some other figure, such as the 120 years that
were supposed to have been the span of Moses’ life (Deut. 34:7), as reflected in the Jewish
blessing: “May you live to 120 [years of age]!” Also, we could vary the number of Planets;
for example, we could also consider the three Outer Planets, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto, as
well as the traditional Seven – or even hypothetical Planets beyond Pluto, e.g., Persephone
and Hera/Durga, discussed in Chapters 11 and 12 of this part of Volume 2. Suppose the
ideal length of life is X and the total number of Planets and Lights together is Y. Then the
length of any given Planetary Age is X/Y. On the other hand, in ascending order, the order
of the Planetary Ages corresponds to that of the Planets and Lights associated with those
Ages, according to their apparent radial velocity across the sky from day to day, as seen from
Earth, from most to least rapid in motion.* E.g., the First Age is ruled by Luna, Who moves
the most swiftly through our skies; the Second Age, by Mercury, next swiftest; the Third
Age, by Venus; the Fourth Age, by Sol; the Fifth, by Mars; and so on.** In general, if a
Planet is nth in order of its speed of motion through the sky, night after night, then its Age
spans the period [(n-1) x X/Y + 1] through (n x X/Y) years of life.
For example, if the ideal length of life is 120 years and there are ten Planets, Luna
through Pluto, a Planetary Age is 12 years long. And given that a Planet is nth in order of its
apparent speed of motion through the sky, taken on a night-by-night basis, then a given
 Planetary Age comprises the years [(n - 1) x 12] through n x 12. Thus, e.g., Jupiter’s
Planetary Age would be the Sixth, beginning at 5 x 12 + 1 = 61 years of age and continuing
through 6 x 12 = 72 years; Pluto’s would be the Tenth, beginning at 9 x 12 + 1 = 109 years
and continuing through 10 x 12 = 120; and so on.
If, however, the ideal length of life were 70 years and there were a total of 12 Planets
and Lights, one Planetary Age would be 70/12 = 5.8333 . . . years long. Then, say, the
Planetary Age of Uranus, the 8th Planet, would span the period 7 x (70/12) + 1 =
41.8333 . . . through 8 x (70/12) = 46.6666. . . years of life (from 41 years plus 10 months to
46 years and 8 months of age).
According to Alan Oken, however, Sol’s Planetary Age covers the years 23-41.† Oken,
like most other astrologers, uses only the seven traditional bodies, the Sun, Moon, and
Planets out through Saturn, and an ideal length of life more or less conforming to the
Biblical “three score and ten,” for determination of the rulers of the Planetary Ages in the
normal sense. He assigns the rulerships of the known Outer Planets, Uranus through Pluto,
to portions of life that aren’t normally considered to be part of bodily life as defined by the
natal chart, such as life in the womb, conception, dream, the period between physical death
and reincarnation, etc. ††
There are many such systems for establishment of the Planetary Ages. Nicholas De
Vore, for example, reminds us of the ancient classification of the Planets as chronocrators
(markers of time), which Shakespeare incorporated into his comedy “As You Like It”:‡

Planet Span Age of Life Stage of Life

Luna – growth 4 years 1-4 The mewling babe
Mercury – education 10 years 15-22 The schoolboy
Venus – emotion, 8 years 15-22 The lover
passion
Sol – virility, vitality 19 years 23-42 The citizen
Mars – ambition 15 years 43-57 The soldier (general)
Jupiter – reflection 12 years 58-69 Judge (scholar)
Saturn – resignation 30 years 70-93 The slippers 43

De Vore also quotes Sephariel on a somewhat altered scheme of this type, modified to
include the Outer Planets:

Planet Span of years Ages

Luna 7 0-7
Mercury 8 7-15
Venus 9 15-24
Sol 10 25-34
Mars 11 35-45
Jupiter 12 46-57
Saturn 13 57-70
Uranus 14 70-84
Neptune 15 84-99
Pluto 16 99-115 ‡‡

Perhaps ultimately, like the various, seemingly irreconcilable systems of mutual

receptions, Sign rulerships for the Outer Planets and so forth, the various systems of the
rulerships of the Planetary Ages may each actually be relevant to differing genotypes. Just as
different peoples are each supposed to be ruled by different Signs and Planets, and each
cultural system seems to have its own astrology, alchemy, numerology and Magickal theory
and practice, so different forms of a particular aspect of a given astrology may accurately
describe different genetic sub-populations of a culture having that astrology.
*It also corresponds, in descending order, to the number of the Sephiroth corresponding to those Planets
and Lights, exclusive of Malkuth (which corresponds to Earth). That is, the First Age is associated
with Yesod, Sephirah 9, Luna’s Sphere of influence; the Second, with Hod, Sephirah 8, the Sphere of
Mercury; and so on up the Tree of Life to the Tenth Age, associated with Kether, Sephirah 1, and the
Planet Pluto. Ages after the Tenth Age would be associated with the new Sephiroth, such as Zero,
Null Set, Aleph2, etc., and with trans-Plutonian Planets.

**As we have seen, this latter ordering is the inverse of the progression of the rulers of the hours by day
and night, i.e.: Luna, Mercury, Venus, Sol, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn (by night: Saturn, Uranus,
Neptune, Pluto, Persephone, Hera/Durga, Luna).

†Oken, op. cit., p. 180.

††Ibid.

‡Nicholas de Vore, op. cit.; and see also http://www.zaytsev.com/Devore/main.html. Curiously,

Shakespeare reversed the Planetary rulerships of the Fourth and Fifth Ages, giving that of Mars to the
Fourth, and that of Sol to the Fifth:

All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant [First Age, Luna]
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
And then the whining school-boy [Second Age, Mercury] with his satchel,
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover [Third Age, Venus]
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier [Fourth Age, here ruled by Mars rather
than by Sol],
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice [Fifth Age, here ruled by Sol, rather
than by Mars] . . .

As You Like It, II, vii, 139

‡‡Ibid., p. 279.

Ecological process, realm, or principle:

Physical chemistry:

Compounds of gold.
The noble gases, of which helium is the lightest.*
*The noble gases are a group of chemical elements with very similar properties: under standard
conditions, they are all odorless, colorless, monatomic gases, with very low chemical reactivity. The
six noble gases that occur naturally are helium (He), neon (Ne; atomic number 10), argon (Ar;
atomic number 18), krypton (Kr; atomic number 36), xenon (Xe; atomic number 54), and the
radioactive radon (Rn; atomic number 86). For the first six periods of the periodic table, the noble
gases are exactly the members of group 18 of the periodic table. However, this no longer holds in the
seventh period (due to relativistic effects): the next member of group 18, ununoctium (atomic number
118; “ununoctium” is a temporary name given to this hypothetical element until such time as it is
found in manifest form due to experiment or naturally, when it will be officially named according to
the rules of nomenclature of physical chemistry and particle physics)**, is probably not a noble gas.
Instead, group 14 member ununquadium** (atomic number 114; “ununquadium,” like
“ununoctium,” is a temporary name given to the element until such time as it is officially named)
exhibits noble-gas-like properties. The properties of the noble gases can be well explained by modern
theories of atomic structure: their outer shell of valence electrons is considered to be “full”, giving
them little tendency to participate in chemical reactions, and it has only been possible to prepare a
few hundred noble gas compounds. The melting and boiling points for each noble gas are close
together, differing by less than 10 °C (18 °F); consequently, they are liquids over only a small
temperature range.

**And no, neither ununoctium nor ununquadium are unobtainium. In engineering, fiction, or thought
experiments, unobtainium (also spelled unobtanium) is any extremely rare, costly, or physically
impossible material, or (less commonly) device needed to fulfill a given design for a given
application. The properties of any particular unobtainium depend on the intended use. For example, a
pulley made of unobtainium might be massless and frictionless; however, if used in a nuclear rocket
unobtainium would be light, strong at high temperatures, and resistant to radiation damage. The
concept of unobtainium is often applied flippantly or humorously. The word unobtainium is derived
from unobtainable + -ium (the suffix for a number of metal elements). The term also closely
resembles the systematic element name for unnamed or undiscovered elements that have an atomic
number of 113–199, for example, Ununoctium. Like unobtainium, these all have five-syllable names
beginning with “un” and ending in “ium.” However, the name unobtainium was in use long before
the IUPAC systematic names were created. An alternate form of unobtainium is handwavium, which
gives you a good idea of what the whole thing is all about.

Colors:

For colors associated with Sol, Aleister Crowley’s Liber 777 gives the following. King
Scale of Color: clear pink rose (Key 6, Tiphareth) and orange (Key 30, Resh). Queen Scale
of Color: yellow (gold) (Key 6) and gold-yellow (Key 30). Emperor Scale of Color: rich
salmon (Key 6) and rich amber (Key 30). Empress Scale of Color: gold amber (Key 6) and
amber, rayed red (Key 30).*
According to Alan Oken, Sol’s colors are golden shades, oranges, and deep yellow
hues.**
Geraldine Davis, in Horary Astrology, gives yellow, inclined to purple.†
Ivy M. Goldstein-Jacobson, in Simplified Horary Astrology, adds royal purple.‡

*See Aleister Crowley, Liber 777, in 777 and Other Qaballistic Writings of Aleister Crowley (York
Beach, ME: Samuel Weiser, Inc., 1983), particularly pp. 45-124, “Explanations of the Attributions
in the More Important Columns of Tables I-VI,” which often adds a great deal of material to that
given in the various columns listed in pp. 2-36.

**Alan Oken, Alan Oken’s Complete Astrology (New York: Bantam Books, 1980, 1988; Library of
Congress catalog number BF1708.1.034-1988), p. 180.
†Geraldine Davis, Horary Astrology (Los Angeles: Tate Printing Company, 1942), p. 37.

‡Ivy M. Goldstein-Jacobson, Simplified Astrology (Alhambra, California: Frank Severy Publishing,

1960), p. 45.

Patterns:

Sunbursts

Solar forms, shapes, lineal figures, geomantic figures, figures related to pure number, and
numerological associations:

De Vore gives circles, full curves, and helical scrolls. *

The Hexagram, Calvary cross, truncated pyramid, swastika, and cube are all Solar. Sol
is traditionally associated with the center-point of the Hexagram.
The Key Numbers of Sol are 6 and 30; the Trump Number of His Tarot Trump, The
Sun, is XIX (19); the value of the Hebrew letter associated with Him, Resh, has the value
200; and the Mystic Numbers of the Sephiroth that are associated with Keys 6 and 30 are
respectively 1 + 2 + . . . + 6 = 21 and 1 + 2 + . . . + 30 = 465. Many other numerological
correspondences with Sol come to mind; for example, in Hebrew, Sol (the physical Star) is
called ShaMaSh (Shin-Mem-Shin), the value of which is 300 + 40 + 300 = 640; so this
number, 640, is also one that could be considered Solar in nature, or at any rate having Solar
aspects. And, of course, as previously mentioned, the number 23 has Solar associations, due
to the 23-day sidereal rotational period of the Solar core. The interested reader may wish to
expand this list even farther. For research in this area, Liber 777 is one of the best possible
places to start; I also highly recommend David Godwin’s Godwin’s Cabalistic
Encyclopedia: Complete Guidance to Both Practical and Esoteric Applications, 3rd edition
(Llewellyn, 1994) for this purpose.
The Magick Square for Sol, used to create Sigils for Solar talismans and amulets, is

6 32 3 34 35 1
7 11 27 28 8 30
19 14 16 15 23 24
18 20 22 21 17 13
25 29 10 9 26 12
36 5 33 4 2 31

*Nicholas de Vore, op. cit., p. 281.

Seal of Sol:
 Seal of the Solar Intelligence, NAKHIEL:

Seal of Solar Spirit SORATH:

Gods:

Egyptian: Ra, Asar, Harpocrates, Hrumachis.

Greek: Iacchus, Apollo, Adonis, Helios, Dionysos, Eris (because of the 23-day long
rotational period of the Solar core, for more discussion of which, see Section 1, above;
also, Eris is the chief Discordian deity).
Roman: Bacchus, Apollo, Aurora, Ops (God of Wealth, etymological source of our English
word “opulent”).
Hindu: Vishnu-Hari-Krishna-Rama, Surya (as Sol), Shiva (the Power of the Sun on the
Waters is one of the principal manifestations of Shiva – the fact that the Sun is fueled by
thermonuclear reactions deep in His mighty heart, reactions identical to those involved
in thermonuclear explosions; that Shiva is God of Destruction; and that heavy water –
oxygen dideuteride or oxygen ditritride is used in production of nuclear devices is a
reflection on the Outer Planes of Sol’s nature on the Inner Planes).
Chinese:
Japanese:
The French Enlightenment:
Sumerian:
Babylonian:
Judaism: Michael, Raphael
Christianity: God the Sun, the Christos, the Solar Logos.
Islam:
Scandinavian: Baldur the Beautiful. (The name in Hebrew for the Sphere of Sol is
Tiphareth, “Beauty.”)
Szekeli (Romany Gypsy):
Russian:
Hungarian:
Africa:
Southeast Asia:
Celtic:
Voudon: Obatala or Oshala, Oshagun.
Oceania:
Native Australian:
American Indian:
American folklore: Gulliver Foyle; Pecos Bill
Science-fiction: Gulliver Foyle
SubGenius: “Bob,” the Fightin’ Jesus.
Discordianism: Eris (see above, under Creek Gods); Porky Pig (because of his sunny
disposition)
The Land of Oz: Ozma, Empress of Oz
H. P. Lovecraft:
Stephen King: the kings in Eyes of the Dragon
LaVeyan Satanism:

God-Name in Hebrew:

‫( תעדו הולא הוהי‬IHVH ALVH V-DA’aTh, or Yehowah Eloah Va-Da’ath)

World Religions:
 Zoroastrianism; Christianity; SubGenius (because of the Solar aspects of “Bob”);
Mammonism (worship of much gold, a Solar metal); the Thule cult of the German Nazis (the
swastika, a Solar emblem)

Archangel:

Michael

Angelic Choir:

Melekim

Angel:

Michael

Angels given by Barrett, et al.:

Barrett:
Angels of Sunday: Michael, Dardiel, Huratapel
Angels of the air ruling on Sunday: Varcan, king; his ministers, Tus, Andas, Cynabal
Wind ruled by angels of air ruling on Sunday: the North wind.
Angels of the Fourth Heaven ruling on Sunday:
East: Samael, Baciel, Abel, Gabriel, Vionatraba
South: Haludiel, Machasiel, Charsiel, Uriel, Naromiel
West: Anael, Pabel, Ustael, Burchat, Suceratos, Capabili
North: Aiel, Ariel, vel Aquiel, Masgabriel, Saphiel, Matuyel
Angels ruling the hours of the day, beginning with the first hour after dawn: Michael
(Sol), Anael (Venus), Raphael (Mercury), Gabriel (Luna), Cassiel (Saturn), Sachiel
(Jupiter), Samael (Mars), Michael, Anael . . .
Angels ruling the hours of the night, beginning with the first hour after sunset:
Sachiel , Samael, Michael, Anael, Raphael, Gabriel, Cassiel, Sachiel, Samael . . . *

*See, e.g., passim, Barrett, op. cit., passim; and Franz Bardon, The Practice of Magical Evocation:
Instructions for Invoking Spirits from the Spheres Surrounding Us (West Germany: Dieter
Rüggerberg/Wuppertal, 1975).

Olympic Planetary Spirit:

Och

Intelligence:

Nakhiel

Spirit:

Sorath

Spirits given by Bardon, Barrett, et al:

Bardon*: The 45 genii of the Sun Sphere, in order (each of these, beginning with Emnasut,
1°-8° Aries, and ending with Debytzet (23°-30° Pisces), rules 8 degrees of the Zodiac): Emnasut,
 Lubech, Teras, Dubezh, Amser, Emedetz, Kesbetz, Emaylsa, Emvetas, Bunam, Serytz, Wybiol,
Lubuyil, Geler, Wybitzis, Wybalap, Tzizhet, Dabetz, Banamol, Emuyir, Dukeb, Emtzel, Tasar,
Fusradu, Firul, Ebytzyrukm Lhomtab, Tzybayol, Gena, Kasreyobu, Etzybet, Balem, Belermche,
Aresut, Tinas, Gane, Emtub, Erab, Tybolyr, Chibys, Selhube, Levem, Basat, Ezhabsab, Debytzet

*Bardon, op. cit.

Name of Planet in Hebrew:

‫( שםש‬ShMSh, or Shemesh)

Commandment from Exodus:

Don’t murder (kill unlawfully or wrongfully).

Exodus 20:13

Ten Plagues of Egypt:

Plague of Murrain (cattle-plague)

Verses from Creation Story in Genesis:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was
formless and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit
of God moved over the face of the waters.
And God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light. And God saw that
the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God
called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening
and there was morning, one day.

Genesis 1:1-5

And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day
from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let
them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so. God
made the two great lights, the greater light to govern the day, and the lesser light to
govern the night; He made the stars also. God set them in the expanse of the sky to give
light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness.
And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning–the
fourth day.

Genesis 1:14-19

Cantos from the Inferno of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos IX-XI (Dis, the administrative center of Hell)

Cantos from the Purgatorio of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos X, XI (the Proud)

Cantos from the Paradiso of Dante Alighieri:

 Cantos X-XVI (The Sun)

Orders of Qlippoth:

‫ ( ןורירגת‬ThGRIRON, “The Litigation”)

Qlippothic Spirit (from Kenneth Grant)

Raflifu (Path 30, Resh). His name should be vibrated mellifluously in the key of D. His sigil
is painted in rayed red upon an amber disc.

Article of Bill of Rights:

Amendment VI

Right to speedy trial, witnesses, etc.

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and
public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall
have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law,
and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with
the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in
his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.

Buddhist meditation: Light

Magickal Power: The Great Work; talismans; crystal-gazing (scrying)

Perfume: Onycha, myrrh

Musical tone: G sharp or A flat.

Qlippoth:

Raflifu: can make things dry up, or make things grow, to radiate a certain energy,
glamour Magick, to unfold new powers.

Legendary orders of being:

Will o’ the Wisp

Element (Alchemical): Gold.

Metals, elements, stones, gems, and metals:

Liber 777 gives chrysolite (Key 30) (see Col. XL); and gold (see Col. LXXXI), which is
the traditional Solar metal.
Oken adds ruby, diamond, cat’s-eye (for Leo, ruled by Sol) and carbuncle.*
Goldstein-Jacobson adds the metal brass, presumably because of its color (brass is
composed of copper and zinc, respectively associated with Venus and, possibly, Pluto
[because of the nutritional role of zinc in the processes of healing, regeneration of the body,
and production of sperm cells]).**
In addition, Dr. George Frederick Kunz (1856-1932 e.v.), a gemologist and mineralogist
of international fame who became vice-president of Tiffany’s at the tender age of 23, gives
the following in his major work on the esoteric significance of precious stones, The Curious
Lore of Precious Stones: alectoria, aetites, garnet, amber, lyncurius, hyena, copper- and
 gold-colored pyrites, thenarcus, and opal. As he says, some of the attributions given by him
are definitely not the usual ones, and “may represent another tradition.” †
Element (chemical): Helium (atomic element 2, the first true element in the Periodic
Table of the Chemical Elements); gold (atomic element 79).

*Oken, op. cit., p. 180.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 45.

†George Frederick Kunz, The Curious Lore of Precious Stones (New York: Dell Publishing Co., 1989),
pp. 350-351.

Plants, real and imaginary:

Liber 777 gives the acacia, ash (Yggdrasil, the World Tree of the Old Norse religion, an
analog of the Tree of Life, is an ash; another example of a Solar tree is Aswata of the
Hindus, the World-Fig, another analog of the Tree of Life), bay, gorse (since gorse presents
the image of the Sun in full blaze), laurel, oak (oak was the sacred tree of the Druids, the
representative of the Sun in the plant kingdom), and the vine (Key 6); and the sunflower,
laurel, heliotrope, galangal (of the ginger family), and all nut trees (the nut is Solar because
it is a microcosm of life, the fruit being also the seed (Key 30) (see Col. XXXIX).
John Lust, in The Herb Book, gives: 1) plants resembling Sol in shape and/or color,
e.g., the orange, the reddish-orange spice saffron, and such yellow flowers as chamomile,
celandine, marigold, and sunflower; medicinal plants which affect the heart, a Solar organ,
such as European angelica, lovage, rosemary, and rue, all of which stimulate circulation of
the blood; and centaury, eyebright (Sol is one of the rulers of the eyes), storax, and
walnuts.*
Goldstein-Jacobson adds all large, showy yellow flowers; and rare specimen trees,
especially those from the desert.**
De Vore, quoting Alan Leo, adds almond, angelica, citrus trees, corn hornwort,
frankincense and other aromatic herbs, heart trefoil, juniper, male peony, poppy, marigold,
mistletoe, olive, pimpernel, rice, saffron, St. John’s wort, sun dew, tormentil, turnsole, and
viper’s bugloss.†
Sun-loving plants of any kind.

*John Lust, The Herb Book (New York: Bantam Books, 1974), p. 572.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

†De Vore, op. cit., p. 300.

Animals, Real and Imaginary:

Liber 777 gives the Phoenix (because of its esoteric symbolism), the Lion (a typical
Solar animal, and the image of Leo, Sol’s traditional astrological dominion) and the Child (a
typical image on Tarot Trump XIX, traditionally assigned to Sol) (Key 6); and the
Sparrowhawk, (associated with Horus, a Solar avatar, symbol of the All-Seeing Eye of God)
and the Leopard (because of its black spots, like sunspots) (Key 30). (See Col. XXXVIII.)
 Goldstein-Jacobson adds the rooster and the peacock, and pedigreed animals such as
horses and cattle (the rooster heralds the dawn, Sol’s exaltation; the peacock reflects the
Solar Splendor*; and pedigreed beasts are extremely valuable, hence a form of wealth, ruled
by Sol).**
Desert creatures and those native to the tropics are ruled by the Sun.

*Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p 44. As can be seen from the discussion of Key 13, above, and Key 32,
below, the functions of Luna and Saturn are very similar in some respects, particularly for progressed
Luna and transiting Saturn, as these influence a particular horoscope. Saturn is Luna’s geocentric
higher octave, her collective expression in geocentric astrology, so this makes sense. But in
heliocentric astrology, Saturn is Sol’s higher octave. The peacock is an ancient symbol for Saturn,
because of its association with the rainbow of the Sign of Aquarius, one of Saturn’s traditional
rulerships, as well as the fact that the Yezidi God, Tawsi Melek, became the “Peacock Angel” of
Islamic hagiology. Here we see a similar relationship between Sol and Saturn in heliocentric
astrology as that between Luna and Saturn in geocentric astrology, in which one of the traditional
symbols of Saturn is shared with Sol, His lower octave. (It must be remembered in this context that
Luna and Earth share the same orbit around Sol, so that “geocentric” astrology is, to some extent,
“Lunarcentric” astrology, as well.)

**Ibid., p. 45.

Creatures in general:

Foods, drugs, flavors, perfumes, and tastes:

For vegetable drugs, i.e., those made from plants and plant-products, Liber 777 gives
alcohol, because it is sacred to Bacchus/Dionysos, and also because it is an all-purpose
menstrum for the Astral Light, useful for extractions * of all kinds; and stramonium,
digitalis, and coffee, as direct cardiac stimulants (Sol rules the heart) (see Col. XLIII, Key
6). For perfumes, it gives olibanum (Key 6); and cinnamon and “all glorious odors” (Key
30) (see Col. XLII).
For perfumes of Sunday, Barrett gives “red sanders” (sandalwood?).**
For flavors, De Vore gives “sweetness” and “pungency.”†
Goldstein-Jacobson gives fine wines and rare liqueurs.‡
Homeopathic tinctures of gold or any Solar substance or material, including Solar foods,
herbs, and animal tissue, are excellent Solar drugs for use in Magickal Workings dedicated
to Sol. I suggest that the number of dilutions employed in making them be a Solar number,
such as 6, 21, 30, etc. (see discussion above on Solar numerology).
Solar foods include citrus, especially oranges, for reasons already discussed, as well as
dishes made of heart-tissues, since the heart is ruled by Sol.

*
By “extraction” is meant a fluid produced by submersion of a substance in water, alcohol, or other
suitable extraction medium for a certain period of time, that necessary to ensure that specific oils and
other parts of the substance dissolve into the medium. The medium is then siphoned off and used in
whatever way is desired, e.g., for medicinal purposes, as a condensing fluid for evocation, etc. (A
“condenser fluid,” as used in evocation of spirits, is used to provide a suitable medium for
manifestation of the spirit being called up in this way. Usually a piece of blotter-paper, cloth, or other
suitable material is soaked in it, then dried out, and placed in the Triangle of Art, into which the
spirit is called by ritual evocation. The type of condenser fluid used for this is one that is in keeping
with the type of spirit to be called up, e.g., a Solar spirit should be evoked into a cloth or paper
impregnated with a condenser fluid made from Solar materials, such as gold, etc. For more on
condenser fluids, see Franz Bardon, Initiation Into Hermetics: A Practice of Magic (West Germany:
 Dieter Rueggeberg-Wuppertal, 1987), esp. pp. 189-148), and Franz Bardon, The Practice of Magical
Evocation (West Germany: Dieter Rueggeberg-Wuppertal, 1975, esp. 61-115.)

**Barrett, op. cit.

†De Vore, op. cit., pp. 286, 296.

‡Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

Clothing, Magickal Weapons, and other objects, phenomena, and processes:

For Magickal Weapons, Liber 777 gives the Lamen or Rosy Cross (Key 6) and the Bow
and Arrow (Key 30) (see Col. XLI), For Magickal Powers (Col. XLV), it gives the Vision of
the Harmony of Things (also, the Mysteries of the Crucifixion) (Key 6), and the Red
Tincture and the Power of Acquiring Wealth (Key 30).
Sol rules wealth of all kinds, and anything of great value, including that which is
genuine, rare, one of a kind, the Work of a great master, magnificent, splendid, showy,
and/or luxurious. He therefore rules such things as emblems, regalia, and the royal scepter;
magnificent structures and vehicles, such as mansions, royal coaches and barges, and so
forth; rich furnishings, valuable furs, beautiful clothing, brocades, and ornate personal
belongings. Goldstein-Jacobson assigns the rule of the atom to Him because of His rulership
of “that which is unique.”
According to Nicholas de Vore, the Sun rules all glistening substances, and religious
and industrial organizations.*
Sol rules everything that is large, showy, palatial, magnificent in construction, gives
pride of ownership and pleasure in its use and possession, and is easy to see from afar.
Examples include, e.g., mansions and palatial edifices, spas, brothels (which Sol co-rules
with Venus), gambling and sports clubs, great halls, show-boats, theaters, pleasure resorts,
great villas, splendid castles, and great, ornate civic buildings, especially buildings up on
cliffs where they are the more easily seen, and those embellished by towers, minarets, and
other ornate decoration.

*De Vore, op. cit., p. 286.

Anatomy and Physiology:

Liber 777 assigns the circulatory system to Him (Col. CLXXXII).

Oken gives the “generation of vital forces,”* the circulation of the blood, the health of
the spinal cord, and physical growth in general.
De Vore says that it is Sol’s influence upon the anterior pituitary gland that ultimately
regulates the circulation of the blood. He also assigns the rule of the tear-ducts to Him.**
According to traditional authorities, the length of the physical life is dependent upon the
positions of the Sun, Moon, and Planet ruling the Ascendant at birth. Likewise the eyes are
ruled by Sol, Luna, and Uranus. Other parts of the body traditionally ruled by Sol are the
heart, the upper back, the sides of the body, and the spine.
To this list could be added the thalamus and, perhaps, the corpus callosum, of the brain.
Both of these structures mediate the processes by which the Personality and the Individuality
become focused and centralized in such a way that the person has a stable identity, above
and beyond any identity accorded to him or her by others, which is supreme and permanent
in the Personality and Individuality. Cases of multiple-personality dysfunction arise when
this process is disrupted and distorted by trauma of one kind or another, with the result that
 the Individuality no longer has a central focus, and the Personality becomes permanently
multiplied or else completely lost.

*A person born with a natal chart in which Sol is debilitated by His placement – in a Sign or House of His
detriment, with hard aspects to Malefics with stronger placements, etc. – will have little stamina, low
energy, and frequent illness throughout life. See discussion below for more on this.

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 279.

Psychology:

The Ego and the central focus of consciousness. Any central, driving force or ideational
core around or on which one bases one’s life, particularly one’s mental life; and thus, in
cases of pathology, the Idee fixe, ideational core which serves as the mind’s focus in
paranoid schizophrenia. Sol rules the Individuality, as opposed to the Personality. Solar
traits include ambition, dignity, grandeur, authority, and will, particularly the True Will, the
Avocation or Calling in life. The Solar type of person tends to operate more as a result of
inspiration than on the basis of intellect, and is paternal (or at any rate, parental), generous,
masterful, honest, truthful, creative, vital, forceful, sanguine, and melodramatic. Negatively,
this type can become a little too melodramatic, authoritarian, overbearing, pompous,
headstrong, ostentatious, despotic, and too fond of pomp and ritual. And since the ideal
Solar type is quite courageous, an afflicted Solar type can be extremely cowardly.

Diseases:

Liber 777 gives “repletion” (Key 30) (see Col. CLXXXVI).

Goldstein-Jacobson gives constitutional or organic involvement in diseases, such as
might be found in genetically caused disease or congenital conditions; mental unrest,
clouded vision (cataracts?), burning, and severely upsetting symptoms. He reflects
symptoms of Planets which He aspects unfavorably. This is especially true for Saturn; Solar
afflictions of Saturn give chronic, drawn-out constitutional, and organic problems from
which one never becomes entirely free. Afflicting Mars, He gives agonizing pain,
inflammations and hemorrhaging. Afflicting Uranus, He causes sudden, overwhelming and
sometimes incurable conditions, often neurological, psychosomatic, or psychogenic in
origin. Afflicting Neptune, He causes neuroses, hysteria, and wasting away of tissue. When
He afflicts Jupiter or Venus, He brings disease caused by self-indulgence and excess, such as
obesity, heart disease, venereal disease, pathological clotting of the blood, or systemic
toxicity.*
De Vore gives ailments of the heart and the upper portion of the spine; fevers and
degeneration of tissue; organic ailments; fainting spells; and diseases of the spleen.**

*Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 196.

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 286.

Patterns and compounds of color:

Magickal image:

Archangel:
Quarter: Western

Occupations, businesses, employment, and ecological niches:

Sol rules all positions of authority and dignity, such as kings and princes, lieutenants,
magistrates, justices of the peace, managers, athletes, employers of all kinds, executives,
ambassadors, and religious and spiritual leaders. (This reinforces the Satan/Saturn-
Christ/Sol symbolism of the celebrations of Mid-Winter or Sun-Return festivals, especially
Christmas, which takes place at the beginning of Capricorn, ruled by Saturn, the first Solar
month of Winter. Capricorn and the Tenth House rule all forms of authority and power. But
the Sun in Capricorn represents the coming to Earth of the Christ, the incarnation of the
Holy Spirit, the Ultimate Authority over all things on Earth; while Sol in the Tenth House,
the Noon Sun, represents the Zenith of all temporal authority. Thus Satan, or Saturn, is
related to the Christ, or Sun, by a complementary, Figure-ground relationship; and each is
necessary to the manifestation and realization of the other.) On another level, Sol rules
bankers, jewelers, money-lenders, and proprietors and proprietresses of houses of
prostitution, together with the institutions they govern or their careers and occupations.
Professions and jobs ruled by Sol: Actors, actresses, acting, the theater; the science of
biology; creativity; fame and fortune; fathers, husbands, male lovers, male authority
figures; lovers of either gender; men (male persons); heads of nations, the Pope,
presidents, and any other executive authority figures; virility; physical vitality; viability of
a proposed project.

Matters of the horoscope ruled by Sol:

The vitality of the organism, and hence the viability of the matter in question. A weak,
afflicted Sun in a horary chart usually indicates that the question is not important, that the
matter lacks the vitality to endure.
The heart, both the heart of the body and the heart of the matter under consideration.
Any male in a position of authority over one, e.g., one’s employer or boss, one’s ruler or
leader, one’s father, etc. In a patriarchal society, the Sun would also represent a woman’s
husband or lover.
In mundane charts, the Sun rules the king, president, prime minister, premier, dictator,
or other head of a nation. It also rules the Pope.

American emblems, sigils, symbols, myth, folklore, and urban legend:

Music:

Handel’s great oratorios

Grandiose organ-music
Religions anthems of a grandiose type
Richard Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra
The “Sunrise” movement of the Peer Gynt Suite
“Dawn-Song” from the Navajo Blessing Way
Mozart’s “Hymn to the Sun” from Die Zauberfloete
Pink Floyd, “Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun”
“Hail to the Chief”
Johann Sebastian Bach, “Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring”
The Beatles: “Here Comes the Sun”

Poetry:
“The Sun Rising,” by John Donne

Graphic arts:
 All kitsch cards, calendars, etc. featuring Solar motifs
Paintings of Christ

Books and other literary productions:

Autobiographies of leaders and authorities, particularly of heads of state or masters of

their respective crafts; books about lions; books about the Sun; non-fiction works on the
mining and uses of gold; C. S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia; the New Testament.
Cantos X-XIV of Paradiso, Volume III of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy, is the
perfect literary representative of the Sun. Canto XI is especially apt, above all its verses on
the life and works of Saint Francis d’Assisi (1182-1226).

Sculpture:

The Apollo Belvedere

Architecture:

The palace of Louis Soleil (the “Sun King”)

Performance Art:

Cats, the musical.

Films:

Saints and exemplars:

Yeshua ben Yoseph ha Nazareth (Jesus, son of Joseph, from Nazareth, A.K.A. Jesus the
Christ); Alexander the Great; Aslan, in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia; Ozma of Oz,
L. Frank Baum’s character; the Cowardly Lion, from L. Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz (as
an example of an afflicted Solar person); the aforementioned St. Francis d’Assisi.

American emblems, sigils, symbols, folklore, and urban legend:

Far Eastern cosmological associations:

Attributions from the I Ching and Taoist Cosmology:

The Sun is traditionally associated with the Yang and the metal gold.
Also, in his translation of the I Ching, Aleister Crowley associates Sol with the Trigram (“The
Clinging, Fire”):

_______
__ __
_______

In the King Wen arrangement of the I Ching, Li is associated with the following Hexagrams:

14, Ta Yu, “Possession in Great Measure,” Fire above Heaven (Fire in Heaven above)

_______
 __ __
_______
_______
_______
_______

21, Shih Ho, “Biting Through,” Fire above Thunder” (storm with lightning and thunder),

_______
__ __
_______
__ __
__ __
_______

64, Wei Chi, “Before Completion,” Fire above Water (Spring, transition from Winter to Summer),
_______
__ __
_______
__ __
_______
__ __

56, Lü, “The Wanderer,” Fire over Mountain (fire on the mountain, brushfire)
_______
__ __
_______
_______
__ __
__ __

35, Chin, “Progress,” Fire over Earth (Sunrise, dawn),

_______
__ __
_______
__ __
__ __
__ __

50, Ting, “The Caldron,” Fire over Wood (cook-fire, kettle on the hearth),

_______
__ __
_______
_______
_______
__ __

30, Li, “The Clinging, Fire,” Fire above Fire (Elemental Fire),

_______
__ __
_______
_______
 __ __
_______

38, K’uei, “Opposition,” Fire over Lake (separation, opposition, distancing),

_______
__ __
_______
__ __
_______
_______

13, T’ung Jên, “Fellowship with Men,” Heaven above Fire (Fire flaming up to Heaven),

_______
_______
_______
_______
__ __
_______

55, Fêng, “Abundance” [“Fullness”], Thunder over Fire

__ __
__ __
_______
_______
__ __
_______

63, Chi Chi, “After Completion,” Water over Fire (Autumn, transition from Summer to Winter),

__ __
_______
__ __
_______
__ __
_______

22, Pi, “Grace,” Mountain over Fire (volcanic eruption, fire seen through a crack in a mountain),

_______
__ __
__ __
_______
__ __
_______

36, Ming I, “Darkening of the Light,” Earth over Fire (Sunset, twilight, night),

__ __
__ __
__ __
_______
__ __
_______
 37, Chia Jên, “The Family” [“The Clan”], Wind over Fire (interrelationships among family members,
genealogy, lineage, lines of duty),

_______
_______
__ __
_______
__ __
_______

and

49, Ko, “Revolution” [“Molting”), Lake over Fire (political revolution, release of a butterfly from its
cocoon, snake shedding its skin, earthquake),

__ __
_______
_______
_______
__ __
_______

In particular, Hexagram 30, also called Li, is an archetypal expression of Li. Oddly, the number of this
Hexagram, 30, is the same as the Key Number of the 20th Atu, Resh, associated with Sol and Tarot
Trump XIX, The Sun.
However, it must be remembered that the original Taoist ascription for Sol is Yang, which is, rather
than an Element per se, an even more primordial building-block of reality. Out of Yang and Yin
(associated with Luna and silver) are all the other Elements created, and into which the latter ultimately
decompose.
There are five Elements in the Taoist cosmology: Fire, Water, Air or Wood (the energy and
manifestations of natural growth, e.g., trees, bushes, animal flesh, etc.), Metal (the energy and
manifestation of artificial things, e.g., tools or weapons fashioned out of metal), and Earth. Fire is
associated with Mars, Earth with Saturn, Wood/Air with Jupiter, Metal with Venus, and Water with
Mercury. The Sun and the Moon do not have Elemental correspondences as such in Taoist cosmology,
but rather the primordial correspondences of Yang and Yin. Earth, chi, is composed of the Elements,
which are in turn composed of various proportions of Yang (positive/male/light/radiating) and Yin
(negative/female/dark/receptive). Crowley’s ascription is logical to Western minds, but it does not
correspond with Taoist cosmology or philosophy.

Attributions from Ninpo (Way of the Ninja, Way of Wisdom) and Shinto (Way of the Kami or Gods):

Fire

Trigram from the I Ching:

b. Design and Title of Trump

Gringonneur Tarot:

Bembo Tarot:

Swiss Tarot:
Insight Tarot:

Marseille Tarot:

Italian Tarot:

Wirth Tarot:

Waite Tarot:

B.O.T.A. Tarot:

Aquarius Tarot: Like Waite’s version, except that the cross is of a standard design, and is formed of
living wood.

Crowley Tarot:

New Tarot:

America’s Tarot: The Sun. Children of all races and ethnic backgrounds, playing under a great
golden Sun in a fertile meadow. “Purple mountain majesties” and “amber waves of grain” in
background.

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Two boys pee against a wall while a Sun with Alfred’s smiling face rises
above it.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

c. Divinatory Meanings
Case:

Christian:

Crowley:

Douglas:

Gray:

Golden Dawn:

Grimaud:

Huson:
Kahn:

Kaplan:

Knight:

Lind:

Mathers:

Mayananda:

Papus:

Sadhu:

Thierens:

Ussher:

Waite:

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot: OT: NT:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot:

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

General meaning:

d. Interrelationships of the Path and the Trump

 21. Key 31
Shin c, “Tooth.” Planet: Trump XX, The Last Judgment (in the Crowley Harris pack, this card
is called The Aeon). Fire  or Spirit  (usually symbolized as a small circle above , the symbol for
Fire: ); also, the Planet Pluto – î or ß. Cardinal value, 300; ordinal value, 21. Connects Sephirah 8,
Hod, with Sephirah 10, Malkuth. Roman/English equivalent: Sh, as in “sheep”; aspirated S (as if the S
were preceded by a consonant or vowel and the H following it were to be sounded separately, itself
preceding a vowel), e.g., “Hats-hep-sut,” the Egyptian Pharaoh.

a. Qaballistic Meanings and Theory

The symbolism of Shin is primarily Fiery and spiritual, as opposed to the Watery nature of the 29 th
Path, which is the Corporeal Intelligence, which is concerned with the biological foundation of human
nature. The 31st Path gives the development and evolution of intellectual, scientific, and technological
skills and abilities which have given humanity mastery of the Earth.
The title of Perpetual Intelligence indicates the spiritual factor behind the psychological evolution, for
although Hod is very much the Sephirah of mind, especially the intellect, its own Yetziratic Text states
that it “has no root by which it can cleave, nor rest, except in the hidden places of Gedulah, Magnificence,
from which emanates its own proper essence.” The mental sphere of Hod is of little evolutionary use
without the informing ethical principle of Chesed. The Sephirah Gedulah, or Chesed, represents that
sphere where the greater Intelligences that guide evolution abide, and is itself representative of the
principle of law and order in the Universe.
Thus Shin regulates the motions of the Sun and Moon, the supreme symbols of radiation and
receptivity. In us, it represents the relationship between individuality and personality, and also,
particularly on this path, the relationship between leader and led, for here are the analogs of the first
struggles towards civilization by humanity, the formation of the family, the tribe, and, eventually, the
nation.
Esoteric tradition says that early humanity was guided by Manus, beings on the Inner Planes, such as
Narada, Hermes, Merlin, and others like them. One of the keys to this Path is an understanding of
anthropology, just as keys to the 29th and 32nd Paths are a study of biology and primitive religion.
The beginnings of civilization depended on the taming of fire and its use in the preparation of food,
the making of tools, and protection from wild beasts, and to form centers for communal life. The
astrological* correspondence for this path is thus the Element of Fire; the discovery of the way to higher
levels of physical existence is shown on Trump XX in the form of an angel awakening the dead. This
need not be confused with the Christian belief in the one final assumption of humanity in physical bodies
to heaven – the principle behind the Tarot Trump is the awakening to new and higher levels of life.

*Actually, Alchemical. Astrology shares many of its concepts with Alchemy; but the idea of Fire is
primarily Alchemical in meaning, since it refers to a physical process with spiritual aspects.
Originally astrology was believed to apply only to metaphysical or purely spiritual entities – the sky or
Heavens were not perceived as essentially physical in nature by earlier civilizations, and the study of
Heavenly phenomena was of things conceived to be primarily spiritual in nature. Alchemy, on the
other hand, was the study of the Spirit as manifest in “crude” matter. The two disciplines thus
complimented each other, but worked from essentially different viewpoints.

On a higher level, the fire could be considered as an awakening of the Spiritual Will in man. This is
in accord with the esoteric title of the Tarot Trump: Spirit of the Primal Fire. When the word “Primal” is
used in mystical symbolism it usually refers to spiritual factors, because spiritual being was before
anything is. The awakening of the Spiritual Will implies the sense of individual identity in man, the
realization of himself as a separate immortal being so that civilization arises out of the co-operation of
individuals rather than as a result of the natural aggregation by instinct into herds.*
*By this criterion, beavers, numerous species of primates, ants, termites, bees, wasps, and a host of other
organisms are all civilized – which in fact is true, though their civilizations are not generally like
human ones. Civilization – “city-izing” or “state-izing” – is just as “natural” as herding behavior, no
more nor less. In fact, “herd-animals” can be just as “civilized” as band-, pack-, colony-, solitary-,
and other organisms, in the sense that individuals in herds frequently co-operate qua individuals on
various projects, from raising young and defending one another against attacks by predators to
obtaining food, water, etc. Knight here displays a profound – and, unfortunately, typical – ignorance
about the nature of real living non-human beings. See, e.g., Jane Goodall, In the Shadow of Man,
Revised Edition ((Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Company, 1971, 1988); Paul Corey, Do Cats Think?:
Notes of a Cat-Watcher (Edison, NJ: Castle, 1977); Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson and Susan
McCarthy, When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals (New York: Delacorte Press,
1995); Elizabeth Marshall Thomas, The Tribe of Tiger: Cats and Their Culture (New York: Simon
& Schuster, 1994); Lyall Watson, Beyond Supernature: a New Natural History of the Supernatural
(New York: Bantam Books, 1988); and Lyall Watson, Lifetide: A Biology of the Unconscious (New
York: Bantam Books, 1980).
In fact, our one claim to uniqueness among all the rest of the living world is the fact that we have
a technology of fire shared by no other organism, the ability to make fire at will and create high-
energy technologies that could not otherwise exist on Earth. Even then, we aren’t entirely unique, for
there are a number of other organisms who, though they cannot make fire at will, can use it for their
own purposes: the Corvidae or ravens and crows, who like to “ant” with fire, and can even learn to
strike a match and touch it to a heap of trash to make a fire for that purpose. Many birds have a sort
of vice involving picking up red ants and placing them in their wing-pits, where the ants, stimulated
by the bird’s body-heat and anxious to get free, bite the flesh in which they are thus trapped.
Apparently the stimulation this causes the bird gives him or her some sort of exquisite pleasure, one
which such birds will go far out of their way to seek out and inflict on themselves. If a small fire is
available to them in the form of a brazier or barbecue fire, they will often hover over the flames and
“ant” with the sparks that rise up from the fire, spreading their wings out to catch the sparks in their
wing-pits. Possibly the legend of the Phoenix – which is also associated with this Trump – came from
observations by priests and other bystanders of such birds who, flying by temples in which torches
and braziers were available to them, flew in and began to hover over the flames of the sconces or
braziers, ecstatically “anting” with their sparks.
Frighteningly, the organisms that come closest to rivaling us in our use of fire are not animals at
all, but rather plants, members of the various forms of pyrobotanicals known as chaparral. These
trees, which include, e.g., manzanita and true chaparral, have their origin and primary territory in
areas bordering the great deserts of the American Southwest, e.g., the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas
and California Coastal Ranges, where conditions much of the year are dry and hot. Typical
succession-ecology organisms, they move in quickly once other trees and shrubs which might
otherwise have been too difficult for them to compete with have been removed from their preferred
terrain, generally by brush-fires and forest-fires that have been endemic to such regions since the
beginnings of life on land. They are not alone in this; the gorgeous sequoias or California redwoods
are likewise fire-selected, and like manzanita and chaparral they set seed in the presence of fire,
reproducing when a really hot fire wipes out everything in the area, like the Phoenix going forward
into the future in the form of their gametes even as they themselves are consumed by the flames,
dying that they might live on through their young. This strategy gives the gigantic sequoias a
competitive edge right from the start over would-be competitors who cannot emulate this trick, for the
seed lands in an area that has been cleaned out by fire, so that the growing young sequoia isn’t
overshadowed during its vulnerable youth by older, taller plants, which might otherwise block out the
sunlight and garner all the nutrients and water from the soil it needs to live. And eucalyptus, native
to Australia and Africa but now found all over the world because its gracious beauty has inspired
humans to transplant it to numerous other areas of the globe, produces a sap so charged with volatile,
flammable oils that one doesn’t dare light a cigarette anywhere near a eucalyptus grove during the
hot, dry months – otherwise, the vapors given off by the trees will flash into flame and cremate
everything in the vicinity, including the unfortunate individual who just wanted to feed his nicotine
jones.
However, these pyromaniacal botanical monsters, the chaparral, not content to wait their turn
after an impersonal disaster strikes their habitat, go one step further: they have learned to start their
 own fires, generally by building up a vast positive charge in their roots that attracts Summer lightning
that is so frequent in the hot season in their native habitats. The lightning starts hot brush-fires
which burn the chaparral along with all their neighbors – but unlike many of their neighbors, the fire-
selected chaparral sets seed under fire, and their offspring have a clear field, devoid of rivals, in
which to establish themselves. Like their two-legged kindred spirits, human pyros, for chaparral, Fire
= Sex, in a big way. Next thing you know, they’ll start smelting metal, and then where will we be?!

Thus the gift of Melchizedik* which relates to this Path is asbestos, the strange mineral that resists
the all-conquering fire and thereby symbolizes immortality and the powers of existence that transcend
Elemental life. This symbol stresses the factor of individualization just as the beehive, associated with
Venus, who rules the signs opposite those ruled by Pluto, stresses corporate existence.

*Melchizedek (from the Hebrew ‫ ַמִכְלצ־יִּכצ־י־ קֶצ קֶד ק‬melech-i-tzédek, literally “righteousness is my king”) is an
enigmatic figure twice mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, also known as the Old Testament.
Melchizedek is mentioned as the King of Salem, and priest of God Most High, in the time of the
biblical patriarch Abram. He brought out bread and wine, blessed Abram, and received tithes from
him, Genesis 14:18-20. Reference is made to him in Psalm 110:4 where the victorious ruler is
declared to be “priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.”
Melchizedek is commemorated as one of the Holy Forefathers in the Calendar of Saints of the
Armenian Apostolic Church on July 26. He is mentioned in the Roman Canon, the First Eucharistic
Prayer of the Roman rite.
Melchizedek (Hebrew: ‫צד ק‬-‫מלכצ־י‬, Malkiy-tsedeq) is mentioned twice in the Hebrew Bible. The first
occurs at Genesis 14:18-20, part of the larger story of Genesis 14:17-24 which tells how Abram
returns from defeating King Chedorlaomer and his associates and meets with the king of Sodom, at
which point (KJV translation):

And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the
priest of the most high God. And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of the
most high God, possessor of heaven and earth: And blessed be the most high God,
which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand. And he gave him tithes of all.

The second is in Psalm 110:4, celebrating some victory or conquest of an unnamed king of the
Davidic dynasty. The king is said to be a “priest forever” and a successor of Melchizedek, and the text
is translated (KJV): “The LORD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the
order of Melchizedek.”
The Second Book of Enoch (also called “Slavonic Enoch”) is apparently a Jewish sectarian work
of the 1st century CE. The last section of the work, the Exaltation of Melchizedek, tells how
Melchizedek was born of a virgin, Sofonim (or Sopanima), the wife of Nir, a brother of Noah. The
child came out from his mother after she had died and sat on the bed beside her corpse, already
physically developed, clothed, speaking and blessing the Lord, and marked with the badge of
priesthood. Forty days later, Melchizedek was taken by the archangel Gabriel (Michael in some
manuscripts) to the Garden of Eden and was thus preserved from the Deluge without having to be in
Noah’s Ark.
In the New Testament, references to Melchizedek appear only in the Epistle to the Hebrews (end
I century CE). Jesus the Christ is there identified as a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek
quoting from Ps. 110:4, and so Jesus assumes the role of High Priest once and for all. Abraham’s
transfer of goods to Melchizedek is seen to imply that Melchizedek is superior to Abraham, in that
Abraham is tithing to him. Thus, Melchizedek’s (Jesus’) priesthood is superior to the Aaronic
priesthood, and the Temple in Jerusalem is now unnecessary.
There were one or more early Christian heresies called Melchisedechians, often associated with a
denial of the Trinity.
A collection of early Gnostic scripts found in 1945, known as the Nag Hammadi Library,
contains a tractate pertaining to Melchizedek. Here it is proposed that Melchizedek is Jesus Christ.
Melchizedek, as Jesus Christ, lives, preaches, dies and is resurrected, in a Gnostic perspective. The
Coming of the Son of God Melchizedek speaks of his return to bring peace, supported by the gods,
and he is a priest-king who dispenses justice.
The Midrash and classical rabbinical interpretation

Melchizedek presents a problem for traditional Jewish teachings: he is not a descendant of

Aaron, from whom all priests must be descended - in fact he pre-dates both Aaron and Levi - yet he is
described as a priest. Several explanations were offered. In the Midrash, the Rabbis identified
Melchizedek with Shem son of Noah, who, although also not a descendant of Aaron, was believed to
have officiated as a priest. (E.g., Babylonian Talmud Nedarim 32b; Genesis Rabbah 46:7; Genesis
Rabbah 56:10; Leviticus Rabbah 25:6; Numbers Rabbah 4:8.) Rabbi Isaac the Babylonian said that
Melchizedek was born circumcised. (Genesis Rabbah 43:6.) Melchizedek called Jerusalem “Salem.”
(Genesis Rabbah 56:10.) The Rabbis said that Melchizedek instructed Abram in the Torah. (Genesis
Rabbah 43:6.) Rabbi Eleazar said that Melchizedek’s school was one of three places where the Holy
Spirit manifested Himself. (Babylonian Talmud Makkot 23b.) The Rabbis taught that Melchizedek
acted as a priest and handed down Adam’s robes to Abram. (Numbers Rabbah 4:8.) Rabbi Zechariah
said on Rabbi Ishmael’s authority that God intended to bring forth the priesthood through
Melchizedek’s descendants, but because Melchizedek blessed Abram before he blessed God (in Gen.
14:19-20), God brought the priesthood forth from Abram’s descendants. (Babylonian Talmud
Nedarim 32b; see also Leviticus Rabbah 25:6 (crediting Rabbi Ishamel).)
Rabbi Judah said in Rabbi Nehorai’s name that Melchizedek’s blessing yielded prosperity for
Abram, Isaac, and Jacob. (Genesis Rabbah 43:8.) Ephraim Miksha’ah the disciple of Rabbi Meir said
in the latter’s name that Tamar descended from Melchizedek. (Genesis Rabbah 85:10.)
Rabbi Hana bar Bizna citing Rabbi Simeon Hasida identified Melchizedek as one of the four
craftsmen of whom Zechariah wrote in Zechariah 2:3. (Babylonian Talmud Sukkah 52b; see also
Song of Songs Rabbah 2:33 (crediting Rabbi Berekiah in the name of Rabbi Isaac).) The Talmud
teaches that David wrote the Book of Psalms, including in it the work of the elders, including
Melchizedek (in Psalm 110). (Babylonian Talmud Baba Batra 14b-15a.)
The Zohar finds in “Melchizedek king of Salem” a reference to “the King Who rules with
complete sovereignty,” or according to another explanation, that “Melchizedek” alludes to the lower
world and “king of Salem” to the upper world. (Zohar 1:86b-87a.)

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and Book of Mormon

The Book of Mormon of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints describes the work of
Melchizedek in Salem in Alma 13:17-19. According to Alma, Melchizedek was King over the wicked
people of Salem, but because of his righteousness, his people repented of their wickedness and
became a peaceful city in accordance with the meaning of that name. With respect to Old Testament
prophets, Alma declares that “there were many before [Melchizedek], and also there were many
afterwards, but none were greater.”
Also, in Joseph Smith’s translation of the Bible, Melchizedek is described as “a man of faith,
who wrought righteousness; and when a child he feared God, and stopped the mouths of lions.”
Because he was a righteous and God fearing man, Melchizedek was “ordained a high priest.” The
Translation also describes Melchizedek as establishing peace in his city and being called “the king of
heaven” and “the King of peace” (JST Bible Gen 14:25-40), that he and his people sought to be
translated, like Enoch (ancestor of Noah)’s people were. Finally, the Joseph Smith Translation notes
that, in Hebrews, when Paul speaks of Melchizedek, the order of the priesthood named for him is
without father and mother, etc., and not Melchizedek himself. (JST Bible Heb 7:3)
Other Latter-day Saint views on Melchizedek closely match the King James Bible. The
Melchizedek Priesthood is named after him, so as not to over-use the name of Christ, after whom it
was originally named Section 107:3-4.
According to the Doctrine and Covenants, Melchizedek is a descendant of Noah (LDS Church
Section 84:14; Community of Christ Section 83:2e). There remains controversy whether he was
Shem, or a descendant. John Taylor taught the former – perhaps due to Jasher 16:11, which says
Adonizedek; Bruce McConkie the latter.

Textual criticism and Melchizedek

Genesis 14
 In the Masoretic (Hebrew) biblical text the name is written as two words (“malki zedek”) and
pointed as ‫ ַמִכְלצ־יִּכצ־י־ קֶצ קֶד ק‬or ‫ַמִכְלצ־יִּכצ־י־דָצ קֶד ק‬. In the Septuagint and the New Testament he appears as Μελχισεδέκ,
and in the Latin Vulgate as Melchisedech. In the Authorized King James Version of 1611 he
appeared as Melchizedek in the Old Testament and Melchisedec in the New Testament.
The Epistle to the Hebrews, along with Philo and Josephus, interprets the name as meaning “the
king of righteousness”, all apparently based on the Hebrew words “melek”, meaning “King”, and
“tzedek” (or tzadik), meaning “righteous(ness).” This interpretation is held also by some modern
scholars because in the Dead Sea Scroll 4QAmram 2.3 is found the opposite name Melchi-resha
(“king of evil”) for a chief angel of darkness.
While the interpretation “king of righteousness/righteous king” is not impossible, the word
“malki” contains a possessive pronoun, and means “my king.” The opinion of many modern scholars
is that this interpretation is therefore unlikely, and that the original name was probably “[the god]
Sedeq is my king”, based on the attested Canaanite/Phoenician God “Suduk” or “Sudek”, or, less
likely, “My king is righteous(ness).”
Genesis calls Melchizedek “king of Salem”, traditionally taken to be an alternative name for
Jerusalem. But William F. Albright has proposed that “king of Salem” is a corruption of an originally
different reading which he reconstructed as: “And Melchizedek, a king allied to him (Albright reads
melek shelomo, “of his peace”, instead of melek Salem, “king of Jerusalem”), brought out bread and
wine...” The New American Bible makes a similar note.
Even if the “king of Salem” reading is correct, the equation with Jerusalem co-existed with
another tradition which identified “Salem” as a place at or near Shechem, an early capital of the
ancient kingdom of Israel, on the slopes of Mt Gerizim. The tradition is associated with the
Samaritans, for whom Gerizim (and not Jerusalem) is the site intended for the Temple, and thus
serves an obvious sectarian purpose; yet it is not solely associated with the Samaritans, being found
also in the 3rd or 2nd century BC Book of Jubilees and even in the Septuagint version of Genesis.
Genesis also calls Melchizedek “Priest of El Elyon”, which appears elsewhere as a title for
YHWH. But it has long been suspected that this is a late development, and that Melchizedek was
originally the priest of a God named Elyon, who appears in eighth-century Aramaic inscriptions
paired with El in the common Levantine pantheon. When these verses were taken over by Jewish
redactor(s), for whom El was already identified with YHWH, El-Elyon became an epithet for the God
of Israel.
For the last sentence of Genesis 14:20 the KJV has “And he gave him tithes of all.” Kamal
Salibi observes that Hebrew: ֹ‫שר‬ ֵׂ‫ר‬, ‫ַמֵשֲע‬, m’sr, which does indeed mean tenth, could perhaps also mean just
portion and Hebrew: ‫ִמצ־יֹּכל‬, m-kl, taken to mean from all, could certainly also mean food, so that the
whole means simply He gave him a morsel of food. Salibi also cites Arabic cognates to suggest that
the words “malki zedek” at the beginning of Genesis 14:18, where the KJV has “And Melchizedek
king of Salem ...”, can be interpreted as mouthful of offering, so that the verse begins “And food the
king of Salem brought out, bread and wine ...” The implication is to say that the king (whether of
Sodom or of Salem) brought out food, then gave his blessing, then he and Abram broke bread
together, or, if it is accepted that “Melchizedek” is an artifact of the text, that the whole interchange
was with the King of Sodom.
Genesis 14 does not appear to be derived from any of the usual pentateuchal sources. It is
additionally possible that verses 18-20 (in which Melchizedek appears) are themselves an insertion
into chapter 14, as they interrupt the account of the meeting of Abraham with the king of Sodom.

Psalm 110

Psalm 110 reads in full (NAB version):

(1) A psalm of David. The LORD says to you, my lord: “Take your throne at my
right hand, while I make your enemies your footstool.” (2) The scepter of your sovereign
might the LORD will extend from Zion. The LORD says: “Rule over your enemies! (3)
Yours is princely power from the day of your birth. In holy splendor before the daystar,
like the dew I begot you.” (4) The LORD has sworn and will not waver: “Like
Melchizedek you are a priest forever.” (5) At your right hand is the Lord, who crushes
kings on the day of wrath, (6) Who, robed in splendor, judges nations, crushes heads
across the wide earth, (7) Who drinks from the brook by the wayside and thus holds
high the head.
 The KJV version of the highlighted sentence, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchizedek, has become traditional in English translations, but the Hebrew contains ambiguities.
the New Jewish Publication Society of America Version, (1985 edition), for example, has You are a
priest forever, a rightful king by My decree. Another alternative keeps Melchizedek as a personal
name but changes the identity of the person addressed: “You are a priest forever by my order (or ‘on
my account’), O Melchizedek” - here it is Melchizedek who is being addressed throughout the psalm.

Confusion over Melchizedek’s lineage

Hebrews 7:3 creates some confusion between denominations regarding Melchizedek’s nature and
background. This is how it stands in the KJV, describing Melchizedek as:

“Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days,
nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.”

Different denominations interpret this in vastly different ways. Some say that Melchizedek is
literally like the Son of God (or even is the Son of God) in that he has no father or mother. Others say
that he has been adopted into Christ’s lineage through the Lord’s suffering, still others claim that the
verse has been mistranslated, and that the Priesthood Melchizedek held is what is without lineage,
not Melchizedek. Others claim that the verse merely represents Melchizedek’s not being a priesthood
holder because of lineage (i.e. “without descent” meaning not a descendant of Levi as required by
Mosaic Law.)
The Book of the Bee, a Syriac text, also offers insights contrary to Melchizedek’s purported
immortal nature:

“NEITHER the fathers nor mother of this Melchizedek were written down in the
genealogies; not that he had no natural parents, but that they were not written down.
The greater number of the doctors say that he was of the seed of Canaan, whom Noah
cursed. In the book of Chronography, however, (the author) affirms and says that he was
of the seed of Shem the son of Noah. Shem begat Arphaxar, Arphaxar begat Cainan,
and Cainan begat Shâlâh and Mâlâh, Shâlâh was written down in the genealogies; but
Mâlâh was not, because his affairs were not sufficiently important to be written down in
the genealogies. When Noah died, he commanded Shem concerning the bones of Adam,
for they were with them in the ark, and were removed from the land of Eden to this
earth. Then Shem entered the ark, and sealed it with his father’s seal, and said to his
brethren, ‘My father commanded me to go and see the sources of the rivers and the seas
and the structure of the earth, and to return.’ And he said to Mâlâh the father of
Melchizedek, and to Yôzâdâk his mother....”

A Jewish Perspective from the Torah

Rashi explains that the High Priest known as “Melchizedek” who received tithes from Abraham
after he defeated the four kings in battle, was Shem, the righteous son of Noah (according to the
Midrash Aggada). Abraham was a descendant of Shem. Therefore, if one were to say that the
Melchizedek (Shem) was a progenitor of the Jewish Priesthood (Kehuna), that would also be correct,
as was Adam and Noah, although Abraham won the Priesthood though his merit and not through
inheritance. Thus, the Sages tell us that G-d stripped Malchizedek of the priesthood and gave to
Abraham because the former blessed the later first before blessing G-d. However, although Shem had
assumed the role of High Priest in that he taught Torah to the Patriarchs well before it was physically
brought into the world at Mount Sinai, the official title of High Priest was conferred upon Aaron after
the construction and erection of the Tabernacle. The confusion over Malchizedek being both King
and Priest is solved by knowing that Shem was also a progenitor of the Davidic Monarchy, which
descended from Judah by his union with Tamara, who was the daughter of Shem (or granddaughter
by some opinions).
See, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melchizedek for more.
 While Shin has high spiritual principles behind it, it is a very much down-to-earth Path, so there are
great opportunities to be found on it. It is a Path of living out spiritual principles rather than the
application of the mind to them of the 26 th Path, or the more purely mental bias of the 30 th. Whereas the
29th Path could be represented as a lush wilderness teeming with wildlife, the 31 st Path could be visualized
in the form of the fires of a semi-nomadic tribe seen in the desert darkness.
The psychological factors of the 31 st Path could be said to include the social instincts and the tender
feelings of parenthood and mating, as opposed to the raw Darwinian ones of self-preservation and
reproduction at all costs of the 29 th Path.* The spiritual significance of Shin is aptly represented by the
attribution of the Element of Fire. The taming of fire implies the development of individualized will and
the forethought enthroned in the neocortex of the brain, with the consequent formation of social units in
conscious cooperation, and the development of technology in order to gain dominance over the natural
world.

*You might say that the former are Darwin Reloaded, a testimony to the evolutionary success of social
behavior and the mind-sets that go with them over the every-organism-for-itself, “red in tooth and
claw” paradigm of Darwinian theory in its beginning stages and the badly flawed ideas of the “social
Darwinists” of the late 19 th century, who strove mightily to inflict an oxymoronic asocial social
sensibility on those in power at the time. We are K-strategists, organisms that have few children and
need to take good care of them (as opposed to R-strategists, organisms that have countless babies and
don’t take care of them at all, e.g., cod fish). K-strategists die out unless they at least have enough
social instincts and skills to cooperate with others in the care of the young, especially if those young
have long childhoods, as ours do. Social Darwinism just doesn’t cut it in the long run, any more than
runaway Communism does. Both are pathological extremes of social living which, like most
extremes, rather quickly earn big fat Darwin Awards for themselves.

Because Shin leads to Hod, there is an influence upon it of the civilizing aspects of number and
speech. The power of speech is often used to corrupt or even prevent communication, but this is a
Qlippothic abuse of the divine powers of this Path. Speech is of profound occult significance, which is
hinted at by the term Logos [Greek λόγος (logos), meaning “word,” “speech,” “account,” or “reason”)] for
God. In the New Testament, the Gospel according to John says “In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) The Bible is by no means the only religious
book which reveals the profound higher import of speech. There is a traditional belief that to discover the
real name of a thing is to gain power over it. And in many cultures, two men with the same name are
believed to share the same soul.
Number, like speech, represents actual potencies, and is not merely symbolism. The difference
between chemical elements, for example. is purely one of number, as is also the difference between
different colors, the notes of the musical scale, the temperature of a substance and also its different states
as solid, liquid or gas, and so on.*

* All that distinguishes an atom of one chemical element from one of a different element is the number of
protons in its nucleus. All that distinguishes, say, red from green at the physical level is the
wavelength of the light wavicles (particle which has a massy aspect, the photon, and a wave-aspect;
the term “wavicle” was coined by Einstein to encompass both aspects of light, wave and particle) that
gives rise to the sensations of the different colors. The only physical difference between E above high
C and middle A#, say, is the frequency and wavelength of the two different notes. See next
paragraph, and also Keys 33-126, below, for more on this.

As an example, the atom of the element Krypton has orbital tracks of 2, 8, 18, and 8 electrons about
its nucleus,* and differs from its neighbor, Bromine, in that Bromine has only 7 electrons in the outer**
ring. This difference of number accounts for the widely different physical properties that the elements
display in the world of appearances – Malkuth. On the other hand the nucleus of any element contains
charges of a different polarity [i.e., protons and neutrons], which are held packed in together with
tremendous force, a force which, when released, gives us such necessities of modern life as atomic and
hydrogen warheads. . . . The factor of number could be attributed to the 31 st Path and the factor of the
latent power to the 29th Path and the differences of chemical properties, color, density and so on to the
Sephirah Malkuth, the physical world. Thus we can see how the 29 th and 31st Paths complement each
other in their convergence on Malkuth.

*The number of electrons in a particular orbit corresponds to the mathematical series 2(1) 2, 2(2)2, 2(3)2,
etc. The outer ring of the most stable elements, the ‘inert’ gases, such as Krypton, are always 8. See,
e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodic_table for detailed discussion on this.

**Aw, gee . . . and here we always thought that the Krypton atom proudly displayed a picture of
Superman inside a big circle with a slash over it on its little electronic chest

Whereas the 29th Path represents the hereditary factors which make up man in the world, the power of
his instincts, and the forces of his body, the 31 st Path holds the key to temperament, that is, not hereditary
factors of physique and nervous system, but the projection of a Personality from an Individuality. The
important keys to character here lie not in one’s physical ancestry, but rather in one’s former incarnations.
Thus, as a treading of the 29 th Path is a confrontation with the history of all one’s biological lineage, clear
back to the first life on Earth, which has been recapitulated in the womb, so the 31 st Path can reveal past
lives, or at any rate the factors from past lives which play an important part in one’s temperament in one’s
present life – not everything in those past lives or one’s biological heredity is revealed until the
consciousness of Tiphareth, the focusing point of the Individuality, is attained.
The ascent of the 31st path is an appreciation of the inner forces that make up the physical
appearances of Malkuth, objectively or subjectively. Its descent is the recovery of the factors of the soul
which are important for one’s present life. In one way, Shin may be viewed as a reflection on a lower
plane of the 22nd Path, for all the Paths, particularly those on the same side of the Tree, interlink and are
analogous on lower or higher arcs with one another.

The astronomy and physical reality of Pluto

The discoveries of Neptune and Pluto came about rather strangely – or perhaps a better term is
“weirdly.”
 Unexplained discrepancies in the orbit of Uranus impelled late-18th and early-19th Century
astronomers to look for a Planet further out yet than Uranus, whose gravitational tug on Uranus would
explain those anomalies in Uranus’s path around Sol. In 1856, John Adams in England and Urbain
Leverrier in France, working completely independently and without any knowledge of each other, using
only pure mathematical reasoning, decided that these irregularities in Uranus’s orbit were due to a Planet
further out from Sol than He was. Each calculated where that hypothetical trans-Uranian Planet should be
visible, and on the very first evening that each man turned his telescope to the predicted place, there was
the new Planet, now called Neptune, right on cue.
This sounds like just another triumph of modern science, and proof that using only careful
observation and pure mathematical reasoning, one can solve all scientific problems that can possibly arise.
But this assumption doesn’t take into account the odd fact that Adams and Leverrier based their respective
calculations in part on Bode’s Law. Bode’s Law assets that the orbits of the Planets can be predicted by
means of a scale of proportions based on the following equation:

ax + b,
where a and b are constants and x is a variable. In this case, a is equal to about 48 million kilometers, b is
equal to about 58 million km, and x is some positive integer. Bode’s Law successfully predicts the
positions of the Planets out through Uranus, assuming that the asteroid belt comprises either the remains
of a Planet that was destroyed or the rubble of one that died stillborn. But it breaks down badly for
Neptune, and even more so for Pluto. According to Bode’s Law, the next Planet out from Uranus should
have been about 388 astronomical units from Sol, or some 5.8 x 10 10 km, and the one beyond that, about
1.2 x 1011 km from Him. Instead, as we have seen in the last chapter, Neptune’s distance from our Father
Sol is only 4.5 x 10 10 km, while Pluto’s is 5.9 x 10 10 km – very different values than those predicted for
them by Bode’s Law.
And yet, on September 23, 1946, when, according to instructions from Adams and Leverrier, Johann
Galle trained the great reflecting telescope in Berlin upon the place where they each had independently
calculated, using Bode’s Law, the new Planet was to be found, there was Neptune, exactly as they had
both predicted – one more of many mysteries about Neptune, the Lord of Mystery.
As Lyall puts it, in his marvelous book Lifetide: The Biology of the Unconscious, “Adams and
Leverrier, using the wrong tool, making the wrong assumptions, came up quite independently with the
right answer.”* On top of everything else, after Neptune’s discovery it was found that even the original
calculations by Adams and Leverrier did not completely take into account all the anomalies in Uran us’s
orbit. Uranus still wandered off his predicted path by a slight amount. So in the last years of the 19th
Century, the search began once more, this time for Planet X, the unknown Planet Whose discovery would
clear up, once and for all, all the puzzles of Uranus’s orbit.

*Lyall Watson, Lifetide: The Biology of the Unconscious (New York: Bantam Books, 1980), p. 317.

It was Percival Lowell, founder of Lowell Observatory, who began the search for “Planet X,” as he
called it. Precise calculations predicted where it should be, and a careful search, based on them, was duly
mounted. But for long years, until 14 years after Lowell himself had died, the search for Planet X
remained unfulfilled.
As Watson tells us:

On March 13, 1930,** Clyde Tombaugh – then a young unqualified assistant in the
Lowell Observatory – finished a year of painstaking picking through comparative
photographs of the critical part of the sky. And there, moving almost imperceptibly
across a field of four hundred thousand equally faint stars, was Pluto, God of the nether
darkness. It is no accident that the first two letters of the new planet’s name should be
the initials of the man who decided where to look. And it seems fitting too that,
following Tombaugh’s discovery, it was revealed the Milton Humason of the Harvard
Observatory had a few years previously taken a photograph of the precise location where
Pluto should have been, but seen nothing there. This mysterious failure is officially
attributed to the fact that Humason must have succeeded in obtaining the image of Pluto
 – after all, anyone can do it now – but that it fell right on a tiny flaw in his photographic
plate.204

**On that date, the Sun was in Pisces, ruled by Neptune. It is also of interest that the numerology of that
date is extremely Thelemic: March is the third month; “13” (which is also “31,” the number of AL,
reversed) contains a “3,” and so does “1930.” This constitutes three 3s – or 333, a number of
Choronzon, Worm of Chaos, Demon of the Abyss and the Void. Further, “1930” contains “93,” the
number of the new Aeon of Horus/Aquarius, which had been initiated in 1904 apparently as a result
of Aleister Crowley’s Cairo Working on March 20 of that year.

Pluto also exhibited some disturbing departures from His predicted physical attributes, as well. First,
He was not the giant Planet X that had been predicted, and therefore could not account for the
discrepancies in Uranus’s orbit, which to this day have never been fully accounted for, or for those in
Neptune’s, for that matter, which also have never had a satisfactory explanation.
Second, Pluto’s orbit is egregiously abnormal. Its eccentricity, a whopping 24.8%, is greater than
that of any other Planet; when at perihelion, Pluto comes well inside Neptune’s orbit.* His mean
distance from the Sun is 5.9 billion km, ranging from 7.4 billion km at aphelion to 4.4 km at perihelion.
In fact, as this is written, He has just passed perihelion, His most recent close approach to Sol having been
in 1989, ten years after He came within Neptune’s orbit, and He will not return to the trans-Neptunian
void until after 1999 e.v.

.*However, He also has a relatively high orbital inclination, 17 degrees off the Ecliptic at its greatest,
insuring that there will be no collision between Him and Neptune. This is one aspect of His
resonance relationship with Neptune, i.e., the fact that Neptune’s year, about 168 terrestrial years, is
just two-thirds of Pluto’s 248 t-year long sojourn around Father Sol, such that while the orbits of
these two Planets do intersect each other, it is never the case that both Planets arrive at the
intersection simultaneously and collide. It used to be thought that Pluto was an escaped satellite of
Neptune, but it has been satisfactorily demonstrated mathematically that if that were the case, it
would have taken billions of years longer for Pluto to assume the Solar orbit He now has than the
actual age of the Solar System. On the other hand, since 1977, a number of “weird asteroids”,
anomalous asteroids far beyond the well-known asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, have been
discovered, beginning with Chiron, Who has an orbit between that of Saturn and Uranus. It now
seems likely that these originated in the Kuyper Cloud of comets, a hypothetical Solar accretion disk
containing comets and cometary debris lying between around 35 and 200 astronomical units outward
from the Sun. In addition, this could solve the mystery of Pluto’s origins. At 39 A.U. from Sol, Pluto
is in exactly the right neighborhood for a refugee from the Kuyper Cloud to have taken up residence,
more so even than Chiron, Who lies much closer to Sol. And if that is Pluto’s true birthplace, it
would not have taken nearly as long for Him to have established His current resonance relationship
with Uranus as it would have if He had been, as was believed earlier, a satellite of Neptune’s that had
been knocked out of His original orbit by some cosmic catastrophe early in the history of the Solar
System. Assuming Him to have been a native of the Kuyper Cloud, there would have been more than
enough time since the Solar System came into existence for Him to have taken up His present orbit.
For a detailed discussion of these and related matters, see Alan Stern’s fascinating article, “Chiron:
Interloper from the Kuyper Cloud?” in Astronomy, Vol. 22, No. 8 (August 1994), pp. 26-33.

So here is Pluto, discovered exactly where he was supposed to be – and yet He doesn’t at all fit the
assumptions upon which those predictions were based! Some have concluded from this that the Outer
Planets didn’t exist until we began to look for Them. But it seems far more likely that, like all other
living organisms, we could sense exactly where both Neptune and Pluto, even though we couldn’t see
them with our physical eyesight, but didn’t go looking for Them until we were psychospiritually and
sociospiritually ready to. That is, once we were ready to do so, we found Them right where our
biophysical sensitivities told us they would be. The observations and calculations that seemingly led up to
Their discovery were our way of rationalizing these “discoveries,” tricking ourselves into being forced to
formally and officially acknowledge Their existence, of which we had been fully, albeit unconsciously,
aware all along. That it was Pluto that taught us this lesson is most appropriate for the Ruler of the
incomprehensibly vast, complex Netherworld of the Unconscious and the Afterlife.
Physically speaking, Pluto is so small and so far away that He has an extremely small angular
diameter as observed from Earth. This makes His size and mass very difficult to measure. Many attempts
were made to determine His size by observing the results of His occultation of various Stars. This method,
pioneered by Gordon Taylor of the Royal Greenwich Observatory, had already given good results for some
asteroids. But Pluto is so small, and moves so slowly, that He only rarely makes useful occultations of
Stars.
Finally, in 1978 James Christy, studying photographs made over the years at the U.S. Naval
Observatory in Flagstaff, realized that Pluto’s image was not symmetrical. Instead, it is rather elongated.
Christy suggested that this might be due to the presence of a close, relatively large satellite. The existence
of this satellite, which was named Charon, after the Boatman who ferries the souls of the newly dead
across the River Styx, was finally confirmed by French astronomers at the high-altitude Mauna Kea
Observatory in Hawaii, where a picture was taken which showed the two bodies as separate objects.
With the discovery of Charon, the mass of the whole Pluto-Charon system could now be determined.
From this, it has been found that Pluto has a diameter of about 2,400 km, making Him smaller than Luna,
while His comrade Charon is about 800 km in diameter. The proportionate size of Charon to Pluto is the
largest known of any Moon in relation to its primary in all the Solar System. Nevertheless the two bodies
together have a mass only one-fifth that of our own Moon, Luna. In addition, Charon’s orbital period
around Pluto is 6.3 days, which also turns out to be the same as the time it takes Pluto to rotate once on
His axis; the distance between the facing surfaces of the two bodies is only 17,000 km. As a two-body
sub-system of the Solar System, Pluto and Charon are thus absolutely unique.
Very little more can be known of either Pluto or Charon until we can survey Them at close range,
using either a fly-by space-probe of the Voyager type or even a manned mission. We do know that the
density of both bodies is apparently very low, implying that ice is a major constituent of Their physical
composition. Spectroscopic analysis indicates that Pluto and perhaps also Charon have surfaces coated
with methane frost. From Pluto, Sol would be less than one one-thousandth as bright as He is from Earth;
it would therefore be so cold on Pluto that most gases, with the exception of neon, would be frozen out of
Pluto’s atmosphere – assuming He has an atmosphere at all.
Because Pluto is so small, He cannot possibly be Percival Lowell’s Planet X; any perturbations which
His small mass could produce in the orbits of Neptune and Uranus are far too small to be detected. It has
even been claimed that He is not really a Planet, but rather a former satellite of Neptune, untimely ripped
from the orbit of that great world by some unthinkably ancient catastrophe, the same one that also gave
Neptune’s Moon Triton its weird, retrograde orbit and coated both Pluto and Triton with frozen methane.
This theory, however, has been badly weakened by the discovery of Charon.*

*And see previous footnote, concerning the Kuyper Cloud as a likely nursery for Pluto’s birthplace.

Another theory posits that Pluto is the brightest member of a group of asteroidal bodies in the outer
reaches of the Solar System, the Kuyper Cloud of cometary material beyond Pluto but inside the Öort
Cloud of comets that war the marches of Sol’s kingdom. The asteroid or planetoid Chiron, Who has an
orbit ranging from just inside that of Uranus to just outside the orbit of Saturn, is just such a body, as are
several other “weird asteroids” discovered since. However, radar observations of Chiron indicate that His
composition is rocky rather than icy, as are Pluto and Charon, so if They were indeed born in the Kuyper
Cloud, then another origin may have to be found for Chiron.
The little we have at this time of physical data on Pluto and Charon are as follows:

Physical Data Pluto Charon

Diameter 2,400 km 800 km
Ellipticity Unknown Unknown
Mass 6.6 x 1023 kg Unknown
Volume (Earth = 1) 0.01 Unknown
Density (Water = 1) 4.7 Unknown
 Surface gravity (Earth = 1) 0.20 Unknown
Escape velocity 7.7 km/s Unknown
Equatorial rotation 6.3 days 6.3 days
Axial inclination 50° (?) Unknown
Albedo 0.5 0.5

Until further space-probes or even manned expeditions to the outer limits of the Solar System are
launched, it is unlikely that we will learn appreciably more than what we already know concerning Pluto’s
and Chiron’s physical characteristics.* Still, we have managed to piece together an astonishing amount
of knowledge concerning both of Them, as it is; and with the Hubble Space Telescope and its successors,
we may be able to learn more yet.

*As of 2010 e.v., one space-probe, New Horizons, has been launched to study Pluto. It will arrive there in
2015; on its way, it is observing what it can of bodies outward from Earth, including Jupiter, which it
used for a gravitational “slingshot” assist in 2007 as it flashed by on its way to the Kuyper Belt (for
more on which, see, e.g., http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/newhorizons/main/index.html). And
by the way, you can thank President George W. Bush and his administration for the launch of New
Horizons – whereas, as of 2010, the current denizen of the White House has effectively killed NASA
and destroyed our space program, murdered the Gulf of Mexico, the world’s ninth largest body of
water, destroyed our economy and that of much of the rest of the world, and otherwise done nothing
worth a damn. Still glad Dubya’s out of office?

The Underworld:
Plate Tectonics and the Restless Earth

Recycling of elements through the Earth

Replenishment of soils
Plate tectonics

A Word About Fire

 In Fire: A Brief History, Stephen J. Pyne reminds us that the philosopher Plato described human life
as like that of men in a cave, their only light from flames behind them, their only knowledge of their
universe the shadows dancing before them on the confining walls of their cave. But as Pyne says, that
allegory runs far deeper than Platonic idealism. In Swartkrans, a South African cave, the very oldest
deposits include caches of bones, the remains of the pray of local carnivores. Those well-gnawed bones
include the abundant remains of ancient hominids. Above them, however, is a layer of charcoal, and
above that the proportion of hominid bones to bones of other types of prey abruptly reverses from what it
is below the intervening stratum of charcoal. By the time the bones in the deposits above the charcoal
layer were laid down, hominids had claimed the cave, remade it with fire, and assumed rule over the
whole area. That in an exquisite miniature summarizes what has happened the world over as a result of
the human taming of fire: what happened with early predator-prey relationships also happened with fire.
As we successfully challenged lightning for control over ignition and combustion, the whole world has
become a hominid cave,

illuminated, protected, nurtured, warmed, and controlled by the flame over which
humanity exercises its unique power and through which it has sought an ethic to
reconcile that power with responsibility. Ours became the dominant fire regime of the
planet.*

*Stephen J. Pyne, Fire: A Brief History (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001; ISBN 0-295-
98144-X), pp. 25-26.

The first hominid species known to have controlled fire is Homo erectus (from the Latin ērĭgĕre, “to
put up, set upright”), an extinct species of hominid that originated in Africa – and spread as far as China
and Java – from the end of the Pliocene epoch to the later Pleistocene, about 1.8 to 1.3 million years
ago.* Sites in Europe and Asia seem to indicate controlled use of fire by H. erectus, some dating back 1.5
million years ago. A presentation at the Paleoanthropology Society annual meeting in Montreal, Canada
in March 2004 stated that there is evidence for controlled fires in excavations in northern Israel from
about 690,000 to 790,000 years ago. A site called Terra Amata, located on the French Riviera, which lies
on an ancient beach, seems to have been occupied by H. erectus; it contains the earliest evidence of
controlled fire, dated at around 300,000 years BC. Excavations dating from approximately 790,000 years
ago in Israel suggest that H. erectus not only controlled fire but could light fires.
*There is still disagreement on the subject of the classification, ancestry, and progeny of H. erectus, with
two major alternative hypotheses: erectus may be another name for Homo ergaster, which would
make erectus the direct ancestor of later hominids such as Homo heidelbergensis, Homo
neanderthalensis, and Homo sapiens. Alternatively, erectus may be an Asian species distinct from
African ergaster. H. erectus originally migrated from Africa during the Early Pleistocene, possibly
as a result of the operation of the Saharan pump, around 2.0 million years ago, and dispersed
throughout much of the Old World. Fossilized remains 1.8 and 1.0 million years old have been found
in Africa (e.g., Lake Turkana and Olduvai Gorge), Europe (Georgia, Spain), Indonesia (e.g.,
Sangiran and Trinil), Vietnam, and China (e.g., Shaanxi). See, e.g.,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_erectus for more information.

Perhaps as long ago as two million years, an adolescent hominid, one of the braver – or less sensible
– members of his band, seized a still-burning branch from the margins of a wildfire and experimented
with it, perhaps socially (chasing the girls around with it to make points from the other bachelor males in
his band), possibly practically (setting nearby weeds on fire to see what would happen). He might have
noticed the smoking remains of animals that had been caught in the sweep of wildfire; if so, he wouldn’t
have been the first to do so, nor the first to take an experimental taste of their cooked, savory-smelling
flesh. But he was the first to snatch that branch, one end still brightly burning, from the fire, the first to
think about the possibilities inherent in it. He may even have been the first to use it defensively, swinging
it in a broad arc to knock away a predator suddenly leaping upon him from a high rock. Whatever, he
certainly wasn’t the last hominid to steal fire from the Gods who had sent the lightning to kindle it, nor to
experiment with it to see what it could do, and how he could profit from it.
By a third to half a million years ago, certainly, humanity, or, certainly, our most recent ancestors had
fire by the tail and weren’t afraid to use it. From then on, the hominids were masters of the planet, and
their use of And even before then, wherever we went, we left a signature charcoal trail like no other
creature on Earth. It was our first great power-tool, different from all our other tools in that, like a virus,
it could invade and pervade whole landscapes, reorder the biota of whole regions. It could interact with
our other tools – consider the use of fire to harden wooden tools and structures, for example. As an atlatl
adds thrust to a javelin, so fire added ecological heft to spears, axes, nets, and snares. Burning and
hunting had greater impact together than either had alone. Controlling populations of herbivores by
hunting, flush up or burning off their limiting ranges, or wiping out their predators can profoundly affect
the vegetative cover, i.e., the fuels that feed fire. The result may be more fire or less fire, but the
landscape is unlikely to remain as it was before the application of anthropogenic fire to it.*

*See ibid., pp. 30-31.

The hominid taming of fire had an even more profound impact on the world than that, though. As
Pyne says, we are fire creatures from an ice age. Our ancestors lived during the alternating shifts of
climate of the Pleistocene. For more than two million years, the world alternated between glacial and
interglacial, pluvial and interpluvial, cold and warm, wet and dry. Some places were drowned in ice and
water, while others dried out and became wind-scoured and arid. Forests and grasslands advanced and
retreated across landscapes like enormous, vegetative tides. At a faster tempo, such cycles favor fire.
Over the two-million year reach of the Pleistocene, they favored a fire creature.* But they did more than
that.

*Ibid., p. 30.
 During the Pleistocene, during which ice ages came and went one after another and humans were
gradually chipped out of the hominid rock by the relentless sculpting of natural selection, rapid climate
change was not only possible, but actually the norm. Originally those who study the climate of the
Pleistocene, thought that it was a period of climate stability interspersed with epochs of temperature
change, each coinciding with the advance and retreat of the great Ice Age glaciers. Instead, they found
that the geologically recent fluctuations of Earth’s climate have been far more severe, and occurred far
more quickly, than anyone had previously believed . . . up until around 8,000 BCE. That discovery has
allowed an entirely new interpretation of the rise of human civilization, and shows that weather as we
currently experience it, one of the primary reasons for uniformitarian models of climate and geology, is
anything but a sharp deviation from the norm as it has been for hundreds of thousands of years. We and
our world have existed in a state of calm for the last 10,000 years. Before then, things were very much
otherwise.
It was found that 200,000 and 10,000 years ago, average global temperatures had changed as much as
18° Fahrenheit in just a few decades. The current average global temperature is around 59° F. Imagine it
suddenly rising to 75° F or falling to 40° F within a century or less. We have no experience of such a
world, its sudden perturbations in temperature drastically altering the circulation of the atmosphere that
redistribute the Earth’s heat. Such sudden changes would create catastrophic storms of unbelievable
power and fury. Yet 10,000 years ago, such changes were common. Imagine a world where devastating
storms like Hurricane Katrina in 2005 bludgeon the continents not once a decade or century, but several
times per year, every year, where the tropics are suddenly blanketed in snow on a per annum basis. That
was Earth until 10,000 years ago – and then a miracle happened: the sudden shifts in the weather ceased
completely.* What was responsible for that change?

*See Peter D. Ward, Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the Mass Extinctions of the Past and What
They Can Tell us About our Future (New York: Smithsonian Books, 2007; 978-0-06113791-4), pp.
143-146.

It is quite possible that the accumulated combustion products of all our burning over the million-plus
years finally tipped the scales against the wild, wild weather of the Pleistocene epoch in favor of the
relative meteorological stability of the Holocene, the period beginning around 12,000 years ago, during
which humanity established our civilizations and began to reach for the stars. Thanks to the global
warming created by the byproducts of our use of fire, the world finally got a respite from the
climatological Furies that had tormented it for hundreds of thousands of years, and humanity got the
opportunity to expand our numbers and create civilizations that would never have arisen if not for the
retreat of the ice. We and our hominid ancestors before us literally remade the world by our use of fire.
Worried as so many of us are now about global warming, we might not be here to worry, and certainly
wouldn’t have produced the sciences that have given us the tools to gather and weigh the data (not to
mention the civilization protecting and promoting such scientific activity) which have shown us that there
is something to worry about, without that warming and the climatic stability it conferred on our world.
The taming of fire made us human in many ways. For example, it enabled the cooking of food.
Before then, all food was eaten raw. Like us, our hominid and pre-hominid ancestors were omnivores
who required meat, fruit, and vegetation in their diets. Without fire, meat was eaten with the risk of
contracting deadly diseases either as zoonoses* or as the result of putrefaction, and tough vegetation
required a great deal of chewing, which in turn mandated great jaw muscles to power mastication,
muscles that precluded the swelling of the upper portion of the skull necessary for the evolution of a brain
large and complex enough to facilitate all the behaviors of a technologically advanced species. Fire was a
true gift from heaven, cutting down the risks attendant on eating meat so greatly that, barring accident
and acts of war, hominid life-expectancy must have shot far above what it had been before our ancestors
tamed fire. And once cooking of food made those enormous jaw muscles that had powered the
mastication of plant matter among our ancestors before they acquired fire unnecessary, the hominid skull
was freed to balloon and swell outward and upward, and the hominid brain to expand in kind with it.

*A zoonosis or zoonose is any infectious disease that can be transmitted (in some instances, by a vector)
from non-human animals, both wild and domestic, to humans or from humans to non-human animals
(the latter is sometimes called reverse zoonosis). Many serious diseases fall under this category. The
 simplest definition of a zoonosis is a disease that can be transmitted from other vertebrate animals to
humans. A slightly more technical definition is a disease that normally infects other animals, but can
also infect humans. The reverse situation (transmission from human to animal) is known as
anthroponosis.

Fire also gave us mastery over both the plant and animal kingdom. It protected us from predators,
helped us to flush out herbage in areas to which we wished to draw game for the hunt, enabled the
elimination of forest where that was convenient for us and, eventually, once the ice began to retreat,
expand available land areas suitable for cultivation and prepare them for planting. Fire gave us the world
as nothing before it ever had or could have.
Before the hominids first made the scene, fire had existed on Earth since the beginning of the
Devonian Period of the Paleozoic Era, 416 million years ago, when levels of atmospheric oxygen finally
rose high enough to support life on land, and the first plants, animals, and fungi began to colonize the
Earth. Before then, combustion, the chemical reaction that we recognize as fire, had been impossible on
our world. Fire requires three things: an ignition source, one hot enough to raise the temperature of
available fuels above that necessary to initiate combustion, around 400-500° F for the sort of fuels that
commonly give rise to wildfires; the fuel itself, mostly in the form of plant tissues, preferably desiccated
by time and the Elements, but still capable of combustion if subject to high enough heat; and plenty of
oxygen. Free oxygen is a byproduct of biological activity, in this case, output by the photosynthesis
carried out by blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) and, eventually, plants. It took for the amount of oxygen
liberated from CO2 and water by cyanobacteria and plants almost three billion years to exceed that
immediately snapped up by the weathering of rocks and oxidation of other materials and locked away
from the oceans and the atmosphere. Once that tipping-point was reached, however, oxygen rapidly
flooded the oceans, then began to exist free in Earth’s atmosphere. By around 416 million years ago,
there was so much free oxygen, a deadly metabolic poison, at large in Earth’s oceans and atmosphere to
trigger a vast wave of death, a mass extinction of all organisms that could neither use oxygen themselves
nor adapt to its presence, a possible contributing cause to the mass extinction that closed out the Silurian
Period and initiated the Devonian. With which the stage was set for the advent of fire on Earth.

*Blue-green algae, the likely ancestors of all plants, still exist today in the form of bacterial mats. Their
fossilized mats, or stromatolites, some dating back 3,5 billion years in age, can be found in many
areas of the world, showing that they are one of the oldest evolutionary lineages on Earth.

Once the levels of atmospheric oxygen were high enough to support combustion once it was initiated,
and the slow but relentless invasion of the land by plants and then animals and fungi had begun, Earth’s
first fires began to dot the night with light and fill the days with smoke as lightning, striking amid
increasingly abundant fuels, set fuels aflame in random strokes. As the levels of atmospheric oxygen rose
and rose, eventually reaching a height of around 35% during the Late Carboniferous Period, 310-300
million years ago, so must the frequency and intensity of lightning-caused fires. During the 60-million
plus span of the Carboniferous, giants stalked the land in the form of meter-long Pulmonoscorpius
scorpions, hawk-sized Meganeura dragonflies, gigantic carnivorous amphibians, and all their monstrous
ilk, whose very existence could not have been possible without that exorbitant flush of atmospheric
oxygen, higher than had ever existed on Earth before then. The first sauropsid reptiles, ancestors of the
dinosaurs, the birds, and modern reptiles, appeared then, as did the very earliest synapsid reptiles, a.k.a.
mammal-like reptiles, from which sprang the lineage that produced the mammals and, among them, us.
But for millions of years, while fire was very much a part of life on land, enabled by life’s byproducts,
it was not itself a truly organic process. It wasn’t for another 300 million years or so that the biosphere
would finally possess fire through the willing hands and minds of a strange naked ape who not only tamed
fire, but tamed the winds and weather of the world through his use of fire, and thereby start a biological
revolution like no other. Today, so ubiquitous are we, so global is our use of fire, that few places on Earth
remain untouched by flame. Anthropogenic fire has largely replaced natural fire everywhere on Earth it
can. Only Antarctica and the glaciers of Greenland are now free of natural fire, and even there we have
brought man-made fire, though far more often in the form of industrial fire, i.e., electricity and other
sources of power that don’t depend on combustion. Almost all fire regimes today are anthropogenic. If,
as some television series and books posit, humanity were to suddenly completely disappear from the Earth
all at once, countless plants, the animals dependent on them, and the fungi commensal with them, would
quickly disappear as well. Ecologically speaking, you can no more go home again than you can make fire
burn backwards; the Earth would never again return to what it was before the hominidae emerged from
African plains apes. Whatever fire regimes then took hold of the Earth, they would never be what they
were before our kind appeared on our world, and the biota of the land would not be what prevailed before
our advent, either.
The introduction of large amounts of free oxygen to the atmosphere and the maintenance or even
increase of those levels not only killed off countless species and made the rise of predators possible, but it
opened the land to the first pioneers to leave the sea – and heralded the time when flame would first
appear there. Natural fire on Earth shaped the biota of the continents and helped determine the course of
evolution of Earthly life from then on. Anthropogenic fire brought about a revolution in the biosphere so
radical that we are still trying to assess it, affecting not only Earth’s biota, but, as the advent of free
atmospheric oxygen did during the Paleozoic did, Earth’s atmosphere and climate, and the very
weathering of her rocks and soils, an evolutionary Judgment Day only equaled in power and scope by the
oxygen revolution of the early to mid-Paleozoic and the birth of fire in the early Devonian. “You can’t go
home again” was never more true than in the context of such evolutionary tipping points; Prometheus,
who gave us fire, had no idea what he was setting in motion when he did so. Shin and Trump XX,
Judgment, along with the latter’s Thelemic version, The Aeon, are apt representatives of the history of fire
on Earth.

*****
Astromythology and Psychospiritual Aspects of Pluto

The Underworld:
The Collective Unconscious and Pluto’s Rule
 Spiritually speaking, Shin is the Path of the Alchemist, ruled by Pluto, Lord of the Underworld and all
its treasures. The latter include the mineral wealth of the soil which nourishes plant-life and thus the
cultivars upon which civilization depends, and the subtler properties of matter which are made manifest
through Alchemical processing and potentiation. See the quotation from J. C. Cooper under Key 27,
above, as well as Keys 58 and 126, which have to do respectively with iron and plutonium, below.
After the Olympians won Their rebellion against the Titans, displacing them as rulers of the Heavens
and the Earth, Hades, one of the three legitimate sons of the Titan Kronos, drew lots with his two brothers
Zeus and Poseidon to see which would become Lord of the Heavens, which ruler of the Seas, and which
would become king of the Underworld. As a result of this lottery Hades won the Underworld for His
kingdom. Specifically he became ruler of Tartaros, the Dreadful Deep, and all the rest of the Un derworld
save the Fortunate Isles and the Elysian Fields – the latter regions were reserved for the spirits of sacred
kings and the virtuous dead, and given to the rule of the former Lord of the Heavens and Earth, Kronos,
who was Himself a sacred king.
Upon their death most spirits go to Tartaros, where their lives are judged and they are given
assignments in the Underworld according to the balance of their deeds, there to stay until they are to be
reborn once more on Earth. It is Hermes Who conducts the dead to Tartaros, the entrance to which lies in
a grove of black poplars on the Far Western shores of the world-girdling River Ocean. If the corpse has
had a coin placed in or on it before burial, it is used to pay the spirit’s way over the river Styx, so that the
spirit may enter Tartaros; otherwise it is condemned to wander forever at the entrance to the Underworld,
never to find peace.

*The only exceptions to this dreadful fate among the penniless dead are those who have somehow evaded
Hermes, their guide to the realms of the Afterlife, in stead creeping down by a back entrance. But a
gigantic dog with three heads – or, some claim, as many as fifty heads – named Kerberos, the equiva-
lent of the Egyptian God Anubis, who belongs to the chthonic Goddess Hekate, guards the opposite
shore of the Styx, ready to devour living intruders and ghostly fugitives who try to enter Hades
illegitimately. So very few of these phantom refugees ever make it safely into the realms of the dead.

The river Styx (“Hated”), which bounds Tartaros on one side, standing between it and the entrance
into its dark and fearful realm, is as black as midnight in deep space, as cold as liquid helium, deadly
poisonous, and as swift-flowing as thought. The tributaries of this ghastly river, all of them as horrible as
the Styx itself, are Acheron, meaning “Agony” or “Woeful”; Phlegethon, “Blazing,” a river of roaring
flames by which the souls of evil sinners are tormented;* Kokytos, “Shrieking” or “Wailing,” the river of
wailing and lamentation; Aornis, “Birdless”;**; and Lethe, “Forgetfulness,” named thus because the
shades of the dead who drank from its waters forgot everything about their past lives. A shade can not
cross the Styx without the aid of a boat. If a soul tried to swim across the Styx, it would be lost forever in
that hellish river’s icy deeps; on the other hand, the Styx is far too broad to cross it by jumping. So the
miser Charon is there, to ferry the shades of the dead across the Styx in his patched and leaky boat – for a
price: the coins which loving relatives or friends of the dead place on the eyelids or under the tongue of
the corpse for just that purpose, to enable them to pay Char on for a ride across the Styx to the other side,
the realm of Tartaros proper.

*This idea may hearken back to a funerary custom of cremation.

**A mistranslation of the Latin Avernus, a volcanic caldera which the Romans believed was the entrance
to Hades. This error is, however, serendipitously strangely apt. The area around the caldera of an
active volcano is literally birdless, since the volcanic vapors vented there are highly poisonous and
would kill any bird foolish, suicidal, or luckless enough to come to near it.

The first region of Tartaros includes the gloomy, grim Asphodel Field, where the shades of heroes
mingle purposelessly among mobs of undistinguished souls that twitter like bats. The one delight of the
shades who stay here, who are without all purpose, totally dejected and without hope, consists of the
libations of blood poured to them by the living. When they drink these bloody draughts, they feel almost
like living men and women again.
Beyond these gloomy meadows lie Erebus (“Covered”) and the palace in which Hades lives with His
queen, Persephone, Whose name means “Bringer of Destruction.” To the left of this palace, upon
approaching it, a white cypress shades the pool of Lethe, from which the common ghosts drink. Initiated
souls, however, drink from the pool of Memory, shaded by a white poplar, and when they are reborn they
often remember past lives.
Close by Hades’ palace, at a place where three roads meet, sit the Judges of the Dead, Minos,
Rhadamanthos, and Aeakos, to try the souls of the newly dead. Rhadamanthos tries Asiatics and Aeakos
judges Europeans,* but both refer difficult cases to Minos.

*At the time and place in which these concepts of the Underworld evolved, over 2,500 years ago in
Hellenic Greece, “Asiatics” meant residents of Asia Minor, and areas nearby what is now modern
Turkey. The Far East and even India were virtually unknown to the ancient Greeks.

Hades is fierce and jealous of His rights, and possessive of His realm. He rarely leaves it for the upper
realms of Sunlight and open sky, except when He is on business – or inspired by sudden lust. It was on
just such a lust-driven junket to the Upper World that He first saw the lovely daughter of the Corn-
Goddess Demeter, the maiden Koré, later called Persephone. He found Her in a meadow, danc ing with
Her maidens, and inspired by overwhelming desire for Her, He kidnapped her and took Her away to His
dark kingdom, to make Her His bride.
Persephone’s mother Demeter, in Her grief over the loss of Her daughter, refused to let anything grow
again on Earth until at last the Gods, desperate to save the Earth, agreed to try to persuade Hades to return
Demeter’s daughter to the daylight world. They decided that if, as ancient custom held, Koré had eaten
nothing during Her stay with Hades, She could go back to Her mother – but other wise, She would have to
stay with Him.
As it happened, Koré had eaten several pomegranate seeds while She was with Hades.* So it was
decided that She could return to Earth – but only for part of each year. Because of the seeds She had
eaten, for part of each She had to return to Her dark Lord and be His queen. So while much of each year
is filled with Nature’s bounty, fertile and alive, because Demeter is then rejoicing that Her daugh ter has
returned to Her from Hades’ dark domains, during Autumn and Win ter, when Persephone – formerly
Koré – goes back to the Underworld to be with Her Lord, Demeter relives Her grief and rage all over
again, and for those Seasons the Earth is therefore barren and cold.

*The pomegranate is a symbol of sexual maturation and fulfillment. Likewise, the Underworld is a
symbol for the psychodynamics of the collective unconscious, particularly that part of it which is
concerned with the ancient, instinctive biological drives such as sex and aggression. In light of this,
clearly this story signifies that Koré, having arrived in the Underworld, there passed puberty and
 began to feel reciprocal stirrings of sexual desire for Hades, Who thereupon took Her virginity and
initiated Her into the pleasures and Mystery of sex (which, incidentally, are among the things
astrologically ruled by Pluto). As a result of that initiation, She abandoned Her childhood name Koré
and took Persephone for Her new name. Having now become a sexually mature woman, with a mind
and desires of Her own, no longer entirely Her mother’s satellite, Persephone now wanted to remain
with Hades. Of course She still loved Her mother, and was more than willing to visit Demeter fre-
quently, hence the agreement that She would spend part of the year with Had es, part of it with Her
mother.

Hades never knows what is happening in the upper world, or on Olympus, except for fragments of
information which He receives when raging or despairing mortals strike the Earth with their hands and
invoke Him with angry curses and oaths. His most prized possession is His Helmet of Invisibility, given
to Him by the Cyclopes when He aided in their release from Tartaros during the war against the Titans.
All precious metals and gems, and other hidden things such as pools of oil or natural gas and the
biological wealth of fertile soil, belong to Him. But He owns nothing aboveground, save perhaps a few
dark temples in ancient Greece.*

*Not to mention their modern descendants, mortuaries, mausoleums, tombs, columbaria, cenotaphs, and
cemeteries – especially those modern thanaterotic botanical parks which, such as Rose Hills or
Forest Lawn in Southern California, might be more appropriately thought of as Disneylands for
stiffs.

Hades’ queen, Persephone, can be both gracious and merciful, save for Her jealous rages at the
nymphs who occasionally catch Her Lord’s lustful eye. She is faithful to Her Lord, but has no children by
Him (or anyone else, for that matter), and often prefers the company of Hekate, Goddess of Witches, Who
shares the realm of the Underworld with Her and Hades, to that of Hades.
Hekate is one of the most powerful of all the Gods – and one of the most feared. Zeus Himself honors
Hekate so greatly that He never denied Her the ancient power by which She bestows on mortals or
withholds from them any desired gift. She has three bodies and three heads: a lioness, a bitch, and a
mare. She is the Triple Goddess in Her most archaic and powerful form. Sometimes She takes the form
of a beautiful, ageless woman, Whose Earthly avatars are post-menopausal women who are still attractive,
sexually active, and potent in mind and body. Such women, because of their experience combined with
their strong sexuality, are often powerful Tantric Magae, feared and revered, so that it is no wonder that
their ruler and protector, Hekate, was likewise an object of both fear and hope by all the ancient world.
Tisiphone, Alekto, and Megaera, the Erinnyes or Furies, live in Erebus. They are older than Zeus or
any of the other Olympians, including Hades and Persephone Themselves. The Furies hear complaints
brought by mortals against the insolence of the young to the old, of children to parents, of hosts to guests,
and of the powerful to their suppliants, as well as crimes of any kind perpetrated against blood relatives.
They punish such crimes by relentlessly hounding the perpetrators, without rest or pause, from city to city
and land to land, until their victims die of it. The Furies are hideous crones who carry brass-studded
scourges, and all their victims die in agony. It is unwise to mention Their names in con versation; for this
reason They are usually referred to as Eumenides, “the Kindly Ones,” just as Hades is often called
Plouton, “Wealthy One.”
Such is the realm of Pluto-Hades and those who dwell there with Him. As we will see, once again we
find that the physical attributes of the Planets and even the mode of Their discovery bear an eerily close
correspondence to Their esoteric and astrological natures, as well as to Their influence and action on the
Inner Planes.
Pluto is the Lord of the Underworld. He makes conscious that which has heretofore been shielded
from the light of consciousness. He rules transformation and transmutation, and is the Lord of everything
that hides away for awhile, like a butterfly’s larva in its cocoon, to reëmerge later in a radically different
form. He rules the primordial forces of the universe: birth, sexuality, death, re generation, rebirth. It is
from His terrible realms that Kundalini energies erupt into our world to work Magickal transformations.
According to Robert Hand:
 As the outermost known Planet, Pluto symbolizes the end of the process Uranus
began: that of breaking down the reality structure of normal consciousness. If Uranus
breaches the normal reality structure and Neptune exposes us to the ultimately real, then
Pluto symbolizes the radical transformation of consciousness and being that must result.
Pluto is the archetype of death and resurrection: it breaks down the old and outworn
entities into their component parts, and then reassembles them into new being.

Whereas Neptune, represented by Trump XII of the Tarot, The Hanged Man, rules concealment and
that which it abets, Pluto, Whose Tarot card is Trump XX, The Aeon, rules the transformations wrought
in that which is concealed during its confinement.
Pluto, as Lord of the Underworld, rules Primordial Fire, the volcanic power of Spir it and Will which,
erupting into the first form of existence in Kether, is sensed by Neptune, in Chokmah, Whose Vision
thereof is passed down to Uranus, in Binah. Uranus takes the Vision and makes it real to the mind of hu-
manity, so that it may finally take on concrete form in the quotidian world of the common man, through
the action of Saturn, in Malkuth. Alan Oken tells us:

. . . Pluto’s . . . symbol [a cross surmounted by a crescent with horns upward, above

which is suspended a circle] is . . . of recent origin, but the esoteric principles it
represents are very ancient. In this emblem . . . the semicircle [the crescent] of the soul
is linked to the cross of matter, and hovering above the two is the circle of spirit.
Here . . . is a capsulization of the whole process of in volution and evolution. . . . [T]he
energy of the spirit descends through the soul so that the continuous and changing finite
forms of crystallized energy may manifest on the Earth (involution). In the reverse pro-
cess, the interchanges of Man with his environment produce an awak ening of
consciousness within his soul, resulting in personal evolution, and on a wider level the
evolution of the human race. The release of the crystallized spiritual force from its
encasement in matter is then purified by the soul and transmuted into the ether of spirit
only to be sent back down through the soul once again to energize Man and the Earth.
Thus . . . Pluto is the force of regeneration [italics the author’s].*

*Oken, op. cit., p. 228.

This process is reflected in the recycling of nutrients in the living world via the decomposition of the
bodies of dead organisms, liberating them for use by the living; in the transformation of larval forms of
animals into their imagoes, as the caterpillar becomes the butterfly, or the small mammalian child, going
through the upheavals of puberty, is transformed into the adult; the shedding of skins and cast ing-off of
old shells by various organisms, to be replaced by new ones; the “deaths” of sperm and ovum in sexual
union, that an embryo may come into being; the transcendence of the Personality and its transformation
into the Individuality. Pluto rules all aspects of these cycles: elimination, death, decomposition, sexual
union, transformation, regeneration, renewal. He works clandestinely and surreptitiously, from the
Underworld of reality, forcing the hidden and the buried out into the light. Just as, in the physical world,
He uncovers, transforms, and makes available to life materials of all kinds which otherwise would be in ac-
cessible to the living world, so in the psyche of an individual or of a family, a com munity, a society, a
nation, or a people, He reveals activities, feelings, and ideas which have long been hidden or repressed,
drawing these clandestine things out of the darkness, into the light, so that they can be rectified and the
energy inhering in them given back to be used by Life.
Pluto rules the Infernal realms, the places in the world and the psyche wherein are hidden all things
that we do not wish to acknowledge as real, or accept as part of our own natures: Inferno, Hades,
Tartaros, Dis, Sheol, Gehenna, Hell, the Abyss, the Void, the Freudian Unconscious into which
everything which we do not wish to face is repressed; concentration camps and prisons; hospitals,
morgues, and insane asylums; homes in which secret torture, terrorization, or even murder of children or
other disenfranchised, helpless people occurs. Unlike Neptune, however, Who works to keep the secrets,
deeds, inmates, and initiates of such places hidden from view, Pluto acts to bring them out into the light
where we can all get a good look at them – often a better look than we really wanted to have. Once the
dead have done their time in the Netherworld, their spirits are once more returned to Life; likewise,
through Pluto’s action, all clandestine, hidden, and repressed matters are thrust into the light of
consciousness at last, where we are forced to acknowledge their existence and deal with them.
For this reason, Pluto also rules wealth, especially in the form of buried treasure. This can include
physical treasures buried in the physical Earth, whether naturally occurring there or put there by human
beings. This includes gems, gas, oil, artesian water, the mineral salts so necessary to plant development
that are contained in fertile soil, buried pirates’ chests, and sunken ships;* but they can also take the form
of information, ideas, and knowledge which, however painful their emergence into the light of day may be
at the time, ultimately prove to be of enormous value, whether for scientific, technological, or other
mundane application, or in terms of spiritual reality. Thus Pluto rules psychoanalysis, the process of
consciously reclaiming buried memories of ancient horrors of early experience, and such processes as
family or addiction-recovery therapy, in which the pathological patterns of behavior that have made the
lives of the sufferers and their families a Hell on Earth are made conscious to all concerned, so that they
can be transformed into healthier forms that better serve life.

*The abyssal deeps of the oceans are ruled by Pluto as well as by Neptune. Pluto’s avatars in sea-going
cultures such as the various Polynesian peoples are Lords of the great deeps of the ocean, such as
Ta’aroa of the Tahitians (Kanaloa of the Hawaiians), Lord of Hell and the Deep Sea. It is in the sea
that members of such cultures often traditionally bury their dead; it is in the ter rible deeps of the sea
that great demonic beings live, such as the giant squid (Bathyteuthis giganticus), the great white
shark (Carcharodon carcharias), sperm whales, and other awesome, frightening beings; and such
cultures frequently inhabit volcanic islands in the oceans that have been built up by still-active
volcanoes, volcanoes which periodically exhibit truly infernal power, emitting deadly poisonous
gases, spewing out gigantic plumes of fire and vast, fast-moving tongues of all-consuming lava – lava
which, once it has cooled, breaks down under the action of weather and lichens to make the most fer-
tile soil in the world. Quite naturally, peoples in such cultures identify the Un derworld with the
oceanic deeps, infernal and demonic power – and the fructifying power and wealth of Hades’ own
domains. Therefore Pluto also rules treasures of the deep oceans, including sunken treasure, though,
strictly speaking, the oceans themselves are ruled by Neptune.

Uranus rules the Timeless, and those things that deal with Eternity; Neptune is Lord of the realms
which transcend Space, of alternate realities; Pluto is Lord of those aspects of reality, and of the
Multiverse of infinite alternate worlds, that require more and/or other than our normal four dimensions of
space and time for their mensuration. He is the Opener of the Way, the Portal not only to outer space in
this universe, beyond the Solar System; He is the Gateway to the In ner Planes, the worlds of the
Unconscious, of Magick, and of the subtle aspects of worlds far away from the Solar System or even in
other, alternate universes.
Uranus is the bridge between worlds, between earth and heaven in the spiritual realm, earth and the
Stars in the physical realm; Neptune is the journey across that bridge; and Pluto is the bill which the
traveler and pilgrim must pay at its far side, for the privilege of crossing.
Pluto is, above all, the Great Transformer, the Alchemist, the Smith. In a man ner beautifully typified
by the shaping and tempering of a Sword of Power by a Master Smith, or the production of the
Philosopher’s Stone from base materials via Alchemical decomposition and re-assembly by an Adept of
the Alchemical Arts, Pluto transforms by creating situations so drastic, terrible, horrible, etc., that one has
to change one’s whole life and self in order to make sense of them and heal oneself of the damage they do
to one, or else go under, go mad, or die.
Pluto’s avatars in the world’s religions and mythologies are numerous. They in clude Hades of the
Greeks; Kali of the Hindus and Her husband Shiva; Ta’aroa of the Tahitians (Kanaloa of the Hawaiians)
together with His sister/wife Pere (Pele), Goddess of volcanoes and volcanism; Dis and Plouton of the
Romans. All of these are fearsome beings, couched in the imagery of death, destruction, and the terrors of
Hell. Perhaps this is because Pluto is concerned with just those aspects of life which we are extremely
reluctant to face, and avoid confronting if at all possible – and with forcing us to face them in spite of
ourselves.
Pluto’s Element, Fire, is perhaps His best symbol. Fire destroys; but as the im age of the Smith hints,
Fire also transforms. It was only through the use of Fire that human technology came into existence,
could come into existence; and it was the creation of ever-hotter and more subtle forms of Fire that has
made modern high-energy technology possible. It is Fire that consumes the corpse on the funeral pyre,
India’s Burning Ghat, rendering the body down into mineral salts and gases that are thus made available
to the living world once more, for the use of Life. Fire sweeps through a forest, killing its trees, revealing
all the secrets which had been hidden by its leaves – and inspiring those dedicated botanical firebugs of
the American Southwest, manzanita, chaparral, and sequoias to release their seed and replenish their
kind. Sweeping through an old building, a disastrous fire reveals criminal secrets of its construction that
a fire marshal can read there and use to bring the perpetrators to justice – and clears the way for con -
struction to begin of a new, sturdy, fire-safe structure that will grace the city in which it is built with its
charm and beauty.
In its functioning and influence, each of the Planets exhibits an aspect of the Solar Spirit, of our
Father Sol. Pluto shares the governance of the Signs of His strength with Mars. Mars represents physical
fire, its flames and heat, including the biological fire of metabolism which, in its pathology, becomes
fever; Pluto is the Solar Phoenix, the processes of thermonuclear fusion by which the vast and an cient
furnaces of the Stars are fueled. Like thermonuclear fusion, Pluto creates new forms out of old ones by the
application and then the release of horrendous energies. On the Inner Planes, Pluto mediates the esoteric
aspects of these titanic Star-fires in the form of Kundalini energy, making it available to the living world
both as chi, the fundamental energy of the body, and in the form of successful man ifestations of Magickal
Workings in the physical, psychospiritual, socioeconomic, legal, and political realms.
It is instructive to consider Pluto’s Hindu avatar Kali. In a way, Kali is even more representative of
the energy and influence of Pluto than is the Greek Hades, for, being female as well as a highly sexual
being, She represents the creative powers of Pluto, expressed in the form of rebirth, redemption,
transformation, and transmutation, in a way which a purely male God cannot. She is also the Hin du
analogue of the Archangel Mikhail, defender of the Throne of Heaven and the peoples of the Earth from
the demons. She is thus an excellent representative of Pluto’s function in Kether, guarding the outermost
bounds of the Solar System from hostile aliens, and the innermost bounds of the Self from alien and de-
monic entities, whether coming from the Tunnels of Set, which are, however repellent and frightening
they may be, still inextricably associated with our world and the Tree of Life, as their distorted mirror-
image, or from Planes associated with worlds of Stars unthinkably far away, perhaps even in other
universes, totally incomprehensible and inimical to us.
This feminine side of Pluto’s influence is in many ways frighteningly more powerful than even its
already awesome “male” powers, comparing to the latter as a supernova explosion compares to Chernobyl.
And like a supernova, even in its inconceivably destructive fury, that feminine power is creative, both in
the sense of begetting life, or at least transforming old forms of life into new ones, and that of protecting
life, the community and its young, from external threat. As professional mercenary soldiers will readily
attest, the most dangerous animal in the world is a female human being defending her young – except that
she can take a poor second to a post-menopausal woman defending all the young of her fam ily and
community, drawing on experiences and training incurred over half a century for both the resources
necessary for that defense and the will and drive to carry it through.
The feminine power of Pluto is at its most evident in Leo, of which Pluto is the diurnal esoteric Lord.
Leo rules pleasure, while Pluto rules Kundalini and sexual ecstasy. Thus Pluto in Leo is the apotheosis of
pleasure. Also, Leo rules birth and children; on the other hand, Aries, Pluto’s diurnal mundane
rulership, is the Sign of Resurrection, or (re-)birth, while Scorpio, Pluto’s nocturnal mundane rul ership,
rules sex and reproduction. Therefore Pluto is the esoteric ruler of Leo, both because Leo rules the end-
products and expression of Aries (birth, children) and Scorpio (sex), and because in Leo, the Sign of
Pleasure, Pluto rules Sex-Magick and Ecstasy, the esoteric expressions of pleasure. Pluto in Leo = Shakti,
the Goddess in Her Aspect of Sexual Ecstasy.
Pluto in Scorpio also displays this female power, though in more subtle, covert ways. Pluto in
Scorpio represents the ultimate sources of Kundalini energy, as Pluto in Leo rules its expression: Scorpio
= Kundalini, Pluto = Kali.
Pluto is the higher octave of Luna, the original archetype of the Great Mother: Plu to in Aries, like
the waxing Moon, rules birth and rebirth, while Pluto in Scorpio, like the waning Moon, rules death and
destruction. Also, Djehuti, the Egyptian Lord of the Moon and equivalent of Hermes, Lord of Magick and
Messenger of the Gods, the mediator between Heaven, Earth, and the Afterlife, is the Psychopompos, or
Lord of the Dead (Pluto) – and both Hermes and Djehuti are hermaphroditic, displaying in the form of
procreative power the bisexuality that Uranus expresses in the form of erotic interplay among individuals.
Ultimately, like those of both Uranus and Neptune, Pluto’s power and influence can’t be understood in
terms of one gender or even one God from one pantheon alone. They are instead multisexual,
multicultural, and transcendent in nature. The Greek God Hades clearly represents much of Pluto’s
function; so does the Hindu Goddess Kali. The Hindu God Agni, like the other Smith Gods, is an other
Plutonian avatar, representing the transformative, multisexual, Alchemical power of Pluto as perhaps no
other can:

There is a vast background of myth which incorporates all transformers; among

these the smith occupies an important but extraordinarily ambivalent position; he can
be venerated as a God or royalty, or despised as an outcast. In some cases he is the First
Ancestor who came down from heaven to found civilization. Like Prometheus, he
brought the secret and use of fire to humanity and had a close association with the sky
and thunder Gods [E.g., Zeus, brother of Hades]. . . .
. . . [I]n all cultures the smith was held in awe and feared as a Mas ter of Fire. He
could reduce solid matter to liquid, something without form, then turn the pliable liquid
into the solid again. Like all ‘creation’ craftsmen, and like the alchemist, he was a
transformer and a transmuter of matter and dealt with the mysterious and ma gical . . .
he turned the formless into form . . . he brought form out of the formless . . . . In his
ambivalent position the smith could be either creator or destroyer. . . .*

*J. C. Cooper, Chinese Alchemy: The Taoist Quest for Immortality (New York: Sterling Publishing Co.,
Inc., 1990), pp. 73-74.

The smith works iron, the metal of Mars, Who shares the Lordship of all the Signs of Pluto’s domain.
Also, in rural communities, the smith often practices blood sacrifice as part of the process of smelting
metal, both human and animal, another reason for the fear and awe surrounding the smith. Above all, he
is the tamer and controller of Fire, the most terrifying, awesome, and puissant of the El ements. In every
culture, he is thus the prototype and ancestor of the Magickian, Alchemist, Sorcerer, Metallurgist,
Chemist, Technologist, Engineer, and Scientist.
Combining within himself as he does both the masculine powers of destruction and the feminine
powers of creation, the Smith is the civilized apotheosis of the Shaman, in whom this bisexuality of
function so often is manifest as well in ambiguities of sexual preference and gender. Oddly, the asteroid
Chiron, with His orbit lying between the orbits of Saturn and Uranus, has come to represent both the
Shaman and the early physical or psychospiritual traumata apparently necessary to initiate development of
the individual into a shamanic being;* and as we saw in the previous section, recent astronomical
discoveries suggest that both Pluto and Chiron had Their origins in the Kuyper Cloud, a belt of cometary
material lying between 35 and 200 A.U. outward from Sol.

*For an excellent, in-depth analysis of shamanic psychology and powers, and their representation by
Chiron, see Melanie Reinhart’s Chiron and the Healing Journey: An Astrological and Psychological
Perspective (New York: Penguin Arkana Books, 1989), as well as Section B, “Chiron and Other
‘Minor’ Planets,” of Chapter 14, “Time’s Orphans – Asteroids, Comets, and Other Solar
Bohemians,” in Part 2 of this volume. The essential difference between Pluto and Chiron seems to be
that whereas Pluto rules the Will, Chiron rules anything that can damage the Will – and the ability to
transcend that damage, thereby somehow gaining one or more of the various powers which are the
provenance of great shamans in cultures all over the world. Possibly the fact that Pluto, along with
His Moon, Charon, is part of a double-Planet system, unlike Chiron, Who wanders all alone in His
endless revolutions around Sol in the vast, empty, frigid Abyss of Da’ath between Saturn and Uranus.
Is the terrible wounding of body, soul, and spirit that is the hallmark of Chiron’s natives analogous to
a “tearing away” of some essential part of Self represented in the Pluto-Charon system by Charon,
and its transcendence and consequent acquisition of shamanic power by many of those natives a
recovery of that torn-away part of the Self on some higher, psychospiritual level? The difference
between the Magus or Shaman and the “healthy”, “normal” man or woman may be that the former
has been devastated in soul and spirit, yet managed to recover what is lost , with psychospiritual
interest, whereas the latter has never suffered such a loss of self, thus never been forced to go on the
Shaman’s Journey, the Quest of the Dragon’s Lair, necessary to its recovery. But it only by that
Journey to the Underworld, into the Dragon’s Lair, to kill the Dragon or be killed by it, that one can
have a chance to gain the hoard of treasure the dragon guards. Charon may symbolize that part of the
Self the loss of which necessitates this Shaman’s Quest. Still, this needs more research. Pluto is,
 after all, the Lord of Magick and of the same Magickal Powers of which the Shaman ruled by Chiron
is Master. Just what relationship Charon has either to Pluto or Chiron, beyond His function as boat-
man across the Styx, isn’t clear; perhaps it is that He is the boatman across the Styx, and it is only by
gaining His help in that crossing that the Wounded One can gain access to the Underworld, find and
slay the Dragon that lairs there, and thus come into the treasures guarded by the dragon, which will
enable him to return, healed and more than healed, to the upper world of Life again.

Hades, combining within Himself his obviously masculine gender and the an cient rulership over
death that earlier cultures ascribed to the Crone aspect of the Triple Goddess, clearly displays the sexually
ambiguous nature of the Smith. So also does Kali, the Warrior-Goddess and Goddess of Tantric Magick,
who combines the terrifying sexual power of Woman with the equally terrifying destroying power of the
Warrior, who is normally male. Perhaps in this is a hint of the ul timate sources of Pluto’s vast and
terrible power: in the roots of being, the primordial sources of all sexuality and creativity, of whatever
form or expression. All the Planets inward from Pluto contain limits, however tenuous, on the expression
of their influence, limits that have to do with gender, station, and a host of other considerations, all of
which are tied into the demands the world makes upon us to fit into some role in life that can be at least
fairly well defined, described, and fitted in to society, even if only at the bottom. Pluto, on the other hand,
has to do with the Will, the absolute determination to achieve some all-important goal, the raw Spirit that
isn’t peculiar to any one gender, socioeconomic niche, or any other socially and culturally defined role in
life. This quality is, in fact, the hallmark of life itself, of biological being, that ancient purposiveness seen
in everything that lives, the absence of which is the defining char acteristic of the abiotic and the dead. No
one gender, ethnic group or even species has a corner on this trait; like both death and conception –
which are also ruled by Pluto – it is something common to everything that lives, from the smallest virus to
Gaia, the whole living world, and on up to the great galaxies, or even the inconceivably vast galactic
superclusters that together form the living community that is our universe. So Pluto’s gender ambiguity
isn’t at all surprising, nor is the fact that it is absolute, infinitely far beyond even Uranus’s weirdly sexu-
ally eclectic nature. It is just one more aspect of Pluto’s ultimate nature as the Lord of Atziluth, the
Archetypal World of the Magickal Will, and of Chia, Spirit, the expression of that world in the
microcosm that is the individual human being: these are the fountainheads in the Macrocosm and the
Microcosm from which all else springs, in the universe at large as within the individual man or woman,
and like them, their Planetary Lord is utterly without restriction in the par ticulars of expression of His
basic nature, which is, I Will.

Sacred Fire

Mythologies from all over the world tell of a culture-hero who stole fire from Heaven and gave it to
mankind. Such stories tell us of the awe in which our ancestors held fire, something so powerful it
obviously must have come from the Gods Themselves, something too powerful to be entrusted to mere
mortal humanity.
What better shows the power of the Will than Fire, whose sole word and desire is Eat?
Shin represents Fire, the sacred Fire that has made us what we are. How appropriate that the great
warrior Hades, one of the three Gods Who led the Olympians to victory over the Titans, Whose planet is
stationed in the remote outlands of the Solar System, standing sentinel to give warning of whatever might
be coming our way from beyond, is coupled with Fire through this Path! It was with Fire that we finally
were able to triumph over the night that had claimed so many of us through the activities of dangerous
predators, Fire with which we guarded our homes and hunting parties and gatherings, Fire we used to
forge weapons of metal with which to retain and expand our dominion over our planet. By Hades’ own
metal, plutonium, and in Hades’ own warrior spirit, we can continue to stand off the night, the dark
between the stars and whatever hostile force it might send our way.
Pluto = power
Pluto = the hidden
Pluto warns of power-struggles, mugging attempts, invasions
Pluto’s fire sees what would otherwise remain hidden until too late to do anything about it
Pluto recycles waste into treasure, makes the utterly rejected the basis of wealth

The funeral pyre. The burning Ghats. Viking funerals and the Battle at the End of the World.

The Dark Between the Stars

xxx

Qaballistic correspondences:

Yetziratic text: “The Thirty-first Path is the Perpetual Intelligence, but why is it so called?
Because it regulates the motions of the Sun and Moon in their proper order, each in an orbit
convenient for it.”

Yetziratic title: The Spirit of the Primal Fire.

Yetziratic attribution:

The Four Worlds:

Key 31, Shin and Trump XX, The Last Judgment, are associated with Atziluth, the
Archetypal World. (Key 11, Aleph, and Trump 0, The Fool, are associated with Yetzirah,
the Formative World; Key 23, Mem, and Trump XII, The Hanged Man are associated with
Briah, the Creative World; and Key 32, Tav, and Trump XXI, The World are associated
with Assiah, the Material World.)

Hebrew letter: ‫( ש‬Shin)

Numerical value: 300

 Principle:

Astrological assignment:

1) Pluto: Barren or fruitful. depending upon aspect and placement (e.g., in Scorpio,
Sagittarius, and Capricorn, barren; in Aries, Leo and Virgo, fruitful); like Mercury, be-
neficent or malefic depending upon aspect and placement; hot; moist; mag netic; feminine.
Pluto has a number of qualities in common with Neptune, and They are both associated with
a number of the same things, such as sacrifice, poison, and death in terrifying forms. Not
surprisingly, they also share a number of astrological characteristics, e.g., moistness,
magnetism, etc. Also, Pluto is neither inherently malefic nor benefic; He represents raw
power, in any form whatsoever, especially that of enormous wealth, which can be used for
either good or evil depending upon the desires and competency of the user, and His
astrological expression likewise can be either benefic or malefic, depending upon aspects of
other chart-elements to Him, His placement, and the desires of those who wish to exploit His
influence.
As mentioned before, The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri, the architecture and
symbolism of which draws heavily from astrology, contains numerous useful hints about the
nature of the Planets. Volume I of that work, The Inferno, is especially useful to astrologers
concerning the nature of the Outer Planets, and perhaps even the hypothetical
Transcendental Planets described in Chapter 13 of Part 2 of this volume of New Magicks for
a New Age.* In the case of Pluto, His transition in order through the Signs Libra, Scorpio,
Sagittarius, and Capricorn is indicated by the following:

(a) Pluto’s entrance into Libra and transition through it by the passages of Dante’s
Inferno beginning with Canto I, verse 1 (“Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra
vita / mi ritrovai per una selva oscura, / che la diritta via era smarrita.” –
“Midway in our life’s journey, I went astray / from the straight road and woke
to find myself / alone in a dark wood.”) and continuing through Canto IV
(Limbo).
(b) Pluto’s entrance into Scorpio and transition through it by Cantos V (the Round
of the Carnal) through XXXIV (exit from the Inferno) of Inferno.
(c) Pluto’s entrance into Sagittarius and transition through it by Volume II of the
Comedy), Purgatorio.
(d) Pluto’s entrance into Capricorn and transition through it by Volume III of
Dante’s Comedy, Paradiso (as Blavatsky and Timothy Leary taught, “Jesus was
a Capricorn”).

2) Fire: The three Fire signs, Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius. These are the signs of
inspiration. Aries’ signature is aspiration; Leo’s is assurance; and Sagittarius’s is
administration. The Fire signs represent the moral or spiritual dimension of the soul,
representing aspiration, conduct, and character.

*The passage from Inferno to Purgatorio also contains some useful ideas along these lines, especially as
concerns the Planets Tubman and Norton (for descriptions of Them and Their nature, see Chapters 3
and 4 of Part 13 of Book 2 of this volume [NM2BM.DOC].

Planetary Age of Man:

Pluto rules the period spanning the transition from death to re-birth.
He also rules Magickal trances in which, looking beyond space and time, the Operator
views truly alien portions of the Inner Planes and makes what he or she sees there conscious
for him-/herself and others. These states are considered to be outside time, and those parts
of one’s life spent in them are part of the Planetary Age of which Pluto is Lord.
By the reckoning that sets the ideal length of life as 120 years, Pluto rules the tenth
decade, that spanning ages 91-100.
 The general attributions of the Tarot:

Trump XX, The Last Judgment

Title of Tarot Trump:

The Spirit of the Primal Fire

Correct Design of Tarot Trump:

The Archangel Israfel blowing the Last Trumpet. The dead arising from their tombs.

Element (alchemical): Fire.

Element (chemical): Hydrogen, neptunium

Ecological processes, realms, or principles:

1) Shin is associated with combustion. Combustion or burning is the sequence of

exothermic chemical reactions between a fuel and an oxidant accompanied by the production
of heat and conversion of chemical species. The release of heat can result in the production
of light in the form of either glowing or a flame. Fuels of interest often include organic
compounds (especially hydrocarbons) in the gas, liquid or solid phase. In a complete
combustion reaction, a compound reacts with an oxidizing element, such as oxygen or
fluorine, and the products are compounds of each element in the fuel with the oxidizing
element. For example:

CH4 + 2O2 → CO2 + 2H2O + energy

CH2S + 6F2 → CF4 + 2HF + SF6

A simple example can be seen in the combustion of hydrogen and oxygen, which is a
commonly used reaction in rocket engines:

2H2 + O2 → 2H2O(g) + heat

The result is water vapor.

Complete combustion is almost impossible to achieve. In reality, as actual combustion

reactions come to equilibrium, a wide variety of major and minor species will be present
such as carbon monoxide and pure carbon (soot or ash). Additionally, any combustion in air,
which is 78% nitrogen, will also create several forms of nitrogen oxides.
Natural fire transformed the ancient world beginning in the early Devonian; beginning
about 1.8 million years ago and continuing up to the present, anthropogenic fire has
radically transformed the world of the Cenozoic in ways almost impossible to comprehend,
making the biosphere dependent on itself, and enthroning humanity as the master of the
world.

2) Pluto, associated with Shin, rules all sub-surface soil ecosystems, and thus (again) the
Kingdom of the Fungi, because of which those systems truly are living systems; those found
in the deep oceanic abysses; and those based in habitats which include areas of very high
heat, such as the ecosystems that have evolved around undersea volcanic vents, in hot-
springs, etc. He also rules the great cycles of nutrients throughout the biosphere, e.g., the
carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, calcium, and potassium cycles (see also Part 13, Chapter 2, on
Amphitrite, associated with Sephirah ℵ1 (Aleph-sub-One), and the “Hypersea,” for
discussion of the mechanism underlying those cycles).
3) Pluto rules plate tectonics and the processes that give birth to volcanoes, earthquakes,
and the sundering and recombination of continents over geologic eons. He rules ecosystems
 found in the caldera of volcanoes, and succession ecologies that spring up in the wake of
forest fires, volcanic eruptions, etc. after previous ecosystems have been burnt or scoured
away by disaster. He rules the succession ecologies of anaerobic microorganisms that occur
in the rotting remains of plants and animals, and the ecological dynamics of recycling of the
bodies of the dead via their ingestion by scavengers such as buzzards, vultures, jackals,
hyenas, etc. His domains include the ecosystems of the great abyssal deeps of the world’s
oceans, especially those around subduction zones, such as the Marianas Trench near the
Philippines, and mid-ocean ridges, with the biotic communities that grow up around the
volcanic vents there.
4) Pluto rules the Hadean Eon of Earthly life.* The Hadean is the geologic eon before
the Archean. It started at Earth’s formation about 4.6 billion years ago (4,600 Ma), and
ended roughly 3.8 billion years ago, though the latter date varies according to different
sources. The name “Hadean” derives from Hades, Greek for “Underworld”, referring to the
conditions on Earth at the time. The geologist Preston Cloud coined the term in 1972,
originally to label the period before the earliest-known rocks. W. Brian Harland later coined
an almost synonymous term: the “Priscoan period.” Other older texts simply refer to the eon
as the Pre-Archean.

*The astrological rulers of the ages of Earthly life and their associated Paths and Trumps are as follows:

As discussed above, Pluto rules the Hadean Eon, which spanned 4.6-3.8 billion (10 9) years before
the present, concluding with the Late Heavy Bombardment. (The Late Heavy Bombardment
(commonly referred to as the lunar cataclysm, or LHB) is a period of time approximately 4.1 to 3.8
billion years ago, during which a large number of impact craters are believed to have formed on the
Moon, and by inference on Earth, Mercury, Venus, and Mars as well. The evidence for this event
comes primarily from the dating of lunar samples, which indicates that most impact melt rocks
formed in this rather narrow interval of time. While many hypotheses have been put forth to explain a
“spike” in the flux of either asteroidal or cometary materials to the inner solar system, no consensus
yet exists as to its cause. One popular theory postulates that the gas giant planets migrated in orbit at
this time, causing objects in the asteroid belt and/or Kuiper belt to be put onto eccentric orbits that
reached the terrestrial planets. Nevertheless, some argue that the lunar sample data do not require a
cataclysmic cratering event near 3.9 Ga, and that the apparent clustering of impact melt ages near
this time is an artifact of sampling material affected by a single large impact basin.)
Neptune rules the Archaean. The Archean (also spelled Archaean, formerly called the
Archaeozoic, also spelled Archeozoic or Archæozoic) is a geologic eon before the Paleoproterozoic
Era of the Proterozoic Eon, before 2.5 Ga (billion years ago, or 2,500 Ma). Instead of being based on
stratigraphy, this date is defined chronometrically. The lower boundary (starting point) has not been
officially recognized by the International Commission on Stratigraphy, but it is usually set to 3.8 Ga,
at the end of the Hadean Eon. In older literature, the Hadean is included as part of the Archean. The
name comes from the ancient Greek “Αρχή” (Arkhē), meaning “beginning, origin.”
Uranus rules the Ediacaran Period (named after the Ediacara Hills of South Australia), the last
geological period of the Neoproterozoic Era and of the Proterozoic Eon – The Ediacaran Period (ca.
635-542 Ma) represents the time from the end of global Marinoan glaciation to the first appearance
worldwide of somewhat complicated trace fossils (Treptichnus pedum).)
Saturn rules the Paleozoic. The Paleozoic or Palaeozoic Era (from the Greek palaios (παλαιός),
“old” and zoe (ζωή), “life”, meaning “ancient life”) is the earliest of three geologic eras of the
Phanerozoic Eon. The Paleozoic spanned from roughly 542 to 251 million years ago (ICS, 2004), and
is subdivided into six geologic periods; from oldest to youngest they are: the Cambrian, Ordovician,
Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian. Fish populations exploded in the Devonian, and
underwent a great evolutionary radiation that gave rise to numerous modern piscean lineages. During
the late Paleozoic, great forests of primitive plants thrived on land forming the great coal beds of
Europe and eastern North America. By the end of the era, the first large, sophisticated reptiles and
the first modern plants (conifers) had developed. The Paleozoic Era ended with the largest mass
extinction in Earth’s history, the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event. The effects of this catastrophe
were so devastating that it took life on land 30 million years to recover, though there are now some
indications that the recovery may have been faster than that.
 Jupiter rules the Mesozoic. The Mesozoic Era, 250-65.5 million years ago, is sometimes called
the Age of Dinosaurs because it was then that most dinosaurs evolved, then went extinct (the sole
exceptions apparently being the birds (Class Aves, who seem to have evolved from the theropod
dinosaurs)). The Chicxulub impact and other events ended the Mesozoic Era, driving a majority of
species into extinction. It is one of three geologic eras of the Phanerozoic (“Well-Displayed Life”)
Eon. (The division of time into eras dates back to Giovanni Arduino, in the 18th century, although
his original name for the era now called the “Mesozoic” was “Secondary” (making everything after,
including the modern era, the “Tertiary”; the current term Quaternary was later proposed for the
modern era, following the same numbering principle.) Coming between the Paleozoic and the
Cenozoic Eras, “Mesozoic” means “middle animals”, deriving from the Greek prefix meso- (μεσο-)
for “between” and -zoon (ζωον) meaning “animal” or “living being.” It is often called the “Age of the
Reptiles”, after the dominant fauna of the era. The Mesozoic was a time of tectonic, climatic and
evolutionary activity. The continents gradually shifted from a state of connectedness into their present
configuration; the drifting provided for speciation and other important evolutionary developments.
The climate was exceptionally warm throughout the period, also playing an important role in the
evolution and diversification of new animal species. By the end of the era, the basis of modern life
was in place.
Mars, the Sun, Venus, Mercury, and Luna successively rule the various periods of the Cenozoic
Era. The Cenozoic Era (meaning “new life”, from Greek καινός kainos “new”, and ζωή zoe “life”) is
the most recent of the three classic geological eras, covering 65.5-0 million years from the present. It
is marked by the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event (also known as the K-T Event) at the end of
the Cretaceous that saw the demise of the last non-avian dinosaurs and the end of the Mesozoic Era.
The Cenozoic Era is ongoing. The divisions, or epochs, of the Cenozoic are, in order:

Tertiary Period:

Paleocene Epoch: 65.5-56 (65.5 ± 0.3 to 55.8 ± 0.2) million years BP (before the present)
Eocene Epoch: 56 to 34 (55.8 ± 0.2 to 33.9 ± 0.1) million years BP
Oligocene Epoch: 34-23 (33.9 ± 0.1 to 23.03 ± 0.05) million years BP
Miocene Epoch: 23.03-5.33 (23.03-5.33) million years BP
Pliocene Epoch: 5.332-2.588 million years BP

Quaternary Period:

Pleistocene Epoch: 2.588 million to 12,000 BP

Holocene Epoch. 12,000 BP to present

Another division of the Cenozoic sometimes used is that of the Paleogene and Neogene Periods:

Paleogene Period:

Paleocene Epoch: 65.5-56 (65.5 ± 0.3 to 55.8 ± 0.2) million years BP (before the present)
Eocene Epoch: 56 to 34 (55.8 ± 0.2 to 33.9 ± 0.1) million years BP
Oligocene Epoch: 34-23 (33.9 ± 0.1 to 23.03 ± 0.05) million years BP

Neogene Period: The Neogene is a geologic period and system starting 23.03 ± 0.05 million
years BP and lasting either until today or ending 2.588 million years ago with the beginning
of the Quaternary. The Neogene Period follows the Paleogene Period of the Cenozoic Era.
Under the current proposal of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS), the
Neogene would consist of the Miocene and Pliocene epochs.

Physical chemistry: Combustion

Physical forces, phenomena, and principles:

 1) The Strong Force: In particle physics, the strong interaction (also called the strong
force, strong nuclear force, or color force) is one of the four fundamental interactions of
nature, along with electromagnetic force, weak interaction and gravitation. The word strong
is used since, for interactions involving sufficiently low energies, the strong interaction is the
“strongest” of the four fundamental forces; its strength is 100 times that of the
electromagnetic force, and several orders of magnitude greater than that of the weak force
and gravitation. (These ratios are in fact figures of convenience; the fundamental figures
vary dramatically according to the distances over which the forces are exerted. For example,
the “weak” force really is roughly as strong as the electromagnetic force at the distances
relevant to its effects, which are a small fraction of the radius of the nucleus of an atom.)
2) Exothermic chemical reactions: An exothermic reaction is a chemical reaction that
releases energy in the form of heat. In other words, the energy needed for the reaction to
occur is less than the total energy released. As a result of this, the extra energy is released,
usually in the form of heat. It is the opposite of an endothermic reaction. Expressed in a
chemical equation, it has the form:

reactants → products + energy

3) Thermonuclear (fusion) reactions: In nuclear physics and nuclear chemistry, nuclear

fusion is the process by which multiple atomic nuclei join together to form a single heavier
nucleus. It is accompanied by the release or absorption of large quantities of energy. Large
scale fusion processes, involving many atoms fusing at once, must occur in matter at very
high densities. The fusion of two nuclei with lower mass than iron (which, along with
nickel, has the largest binding energy per nucleon) generally releases energy while the fusion
of nuclei heavier than iron absorbs energy; vice-versa for the reverse process, nuclear fission.
In the simplest case of hydrogen fusion, two protons have to be brought close enough for the
weak force to convert either of the identical protons into a neutron forming deuterium. In
more complex cases of heavy ion fusion involving many nucleons, the reaction mechanism is
different, but we achieve the same result of assembling larger nuclei from smaller nuclei.
Nuclear fusion occurs naturally in stars. Artificial fusion in human enterprises has also been
achieved, although it has not yet been completely controlled as an energy source; successful
nuclear physics experiments have been performed involving the fusion of many different
nuclear species, but the energy output is negligible in these studies. Building upon the
nuclear transmutation experiments of Ernest Rutherford done a few years earlier, fusion of
light nuclei (hydrogen isotopes) was first observed by Mark Oliphant in 1932; the steps of
the main cycle of nuclear fusion in stars were subsequently worked out by Hans Bethe
throughout the remainder of that decade. Research into fusion for military purposes began
in the early 1940s as part of the Manhattan Project, but was not successful until 1952.
Research into controlled fusion for civilian purposes began in the 1950s, and continues to
this day.
3) The production of gamma radiation. Gamma radiation, also known as gamma rays
(denoted as γ), is electromagnetic radiation of high frequency (very short wavelength). They
are produced by sub-atomic particle interactions such as electron-positron annihilation,
neutral pion decay, radioactive decay, fusion, fission or inverse Compton scattering in
astrophysical processes. Gamma rays typically have frequencies above 1019 Hz, and
therefore have energies above 100 keV and wavelength less than 10 picometers, often
smaller than an atom. Gamma radioactive decay photons commonly have energies of a few
hundred keV, and are almost always less than 10 MeV in energy. Because they are a form of
ionizing radiation, gamma rays can cause serious damage when absorbed by living tissue,
and are therefore a health hazard. Paul Villard, a French chemist and physicist, discovered
gamma radiation in 1900, while studying radiation emitted from radium. Alpha and beta
“rays” had already been separated and named by the work of Ernest Rutherford in 1899, and
in 1903 Rutherford named Villard’s distinct new radiation “gamma rays.” In the past, the
distinction between X-rays and gamma rays was based on energy (or equivalently frequency
or wavelength), with gamma rays being considered a higher-energy version of X-rays.
However, modern high-energy (megavoltage) X-rays produced by linear accelerators
(“linacs”) for megavoltage treatment, in cancer radiotherapy usually have higher energy than
gamma rays produced by radioactive gamma decay. Conversely, one of the most common
 gamma-ray emitting isotopes used in diagnostic nuclear medicine, technetium-99m,
produces gamma radiation of about the same energy (140 KeV) as produced by a diagnostic
X-ray machine, and significantly lower energy than therapeutic photons from linacs.
Because of this broad overlap in energy ranges, the two types of electromagnetic radiation
are now usually defined by their origin: X-rays are emitted by electrons (either in orbitals
outside of the nucleus, or while being accelerated to produce Bremsstrahlung-type radiation),
while gamma rays are emitted by the nucleus or from other particle decays or annihilation
events. There is no lower limit to the energy of photons produced by nuclear reactions, and
thus ultraviolet and even lower energy photons produced by these processes would also be
defined as “gamma rays.” In certain fields such as astronomy, gamma rays and X-rays are
still sometimes defined by energy, or used interchangeably, since the processes which
produce them may be uncertain. (Mem, water, and Neptune are associated with infrared, or
heat, energy, while Aleph, Air, and Uranus are associated with X-rays (X-radiation
(composed of X-rays) is a form of electromagnetic radiation. X-rays have a wavelength in
the range of 0.01 to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30 petahertz
to 30 exahertz (3 × 10 16 Hz – 3 × 10 19 Hz) and energies in the range 120 eV to 120 keV.
They are shorter in wavelength than UV rays and longer than gamma rays. In many
languages, X-radiation is called Roentgen radiation, after Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen, who is
generally credited as their discoverer, and who had named them X-rays to signify an
unknown type of radiation.), and Tav, Earth, and Saturn are associated with low levels of
any ionizing radiation.)

Colors:

Liber 777:

Key 31:*

King Scale of color: glowing orange-scarlet

Queen Scale: vermilion
Emperor Scale: scarlet, flecked gold
Empress Scale: vermilion, flecked crimson and emerald

Key 31-bis:*

King Scale: white, merging into gray

Queen Scale: deep purple, nearly black
Emperor Scale: the seven prismatic colors, the violet being outside
Empress Scale: white, red, yellow, blue, black, the last being outside.

According to de Vore, Pluto’s colors are luminous pigments in unusual shades

containing a large percentage of red.**
Oken suggests that colors outside the range of normal vision may be associated with
Pluto.†
Barbara Watters’ associates Neptune with entropy.†† one might therefore perhaps
assign those frequencies of the spectrum including X-rays and beyond to Pluto (particularly
because X-rays are used to make the otherwise invisible visible to our sight); the portion of
the spectrum from the infra-red on down to the 3° Kelvin background radiation of the uni -
verse left over from the Big Bang, to Neptune, since these all represent the de gradations of
energy from those forms that are easily used to those that are not; and ul tra-violet to Uranus,
since ultra-violet energy is biologically disruptive, reflecting Uranus’s energetically
disruptive actions, but is also useful to many plants as a source of food (i.e., convertible to
stored food via the action of photosynthesis).
Howard Phillips Lovecraft, whose Cthulhu Mythos cycle has been alluded to previously,
is considered by many to be “the Master of Modern American horror fiction,” and in fact is
probably the most famous and acclaimed horror-writer of all time, more so even than Edgar
Allen Poe. He was born under a conjunction of Neptune and Pluto in Gemini on August 20,
1890. The same conjunction witnessed the births of a great many well-known and highly
 acclaimed modern writers, such as J. R. R. Tolkien and H. P. Lovecraft himself, who have
had an almost inconceivably powerful impact upon 20th-Century Western and even global
culture. One of Lovecraft’s most famous short stories was “The Color Out of space,” in
which the protagonist found a glowing meteorite that emitted colors pre viously outside
human ken. More than anyone else who has ever lived, Lovecraft knew Pluto and His effects
intimately, as a part of his day-to-day experience. Through out his life he suffered from
relentless night-terrors of the sort from which the victim struggles to awaken while in
dream-flight from a pursuing fiend, knowing full well that if one should fail to wake before
being overtaken by said fiend, one will be devoured alive on the spot. Sans catsup.
Lovecraft’s stories are replete with instances of the intersection of the quotidian daylight
world with the weird, the uncanny, the obscene, and the alienly evil. In these stories, incest-
uous, and bestial liaisons take place that produce unspeakable half-human, half-alien mon-
sters more repellent, loathsome, and divorced from the human universe than anything wholly
alien could possibly be. Alien Gods are described Who, we are told, are the true owners of
our world, our human Gods only assuming its stewardship in the relatively short time during
which these Others hibernate or take Their cosmic vacations. In Lovecraft’s fiction we learn
that ghouls casually roam our graveyards and subway systems, taking refreshment there as
they will, laughing wildly at all our most sacred and cherished treasures and ideas. More
than anyone else ever has, Lovecraft reveals the effect of Plutonian forces upon the psyche,
as expressed through a literary medium, thereby providing an extremely good description of
the way in which Pluto acts on all levels of life. Many of the images of Pluto’s influence and
action he gives us are negative in the extreme. Yet – as happened to the protagonist of his
“The Shadow Over Innsmouth” – as he grew older these images began to transform into
more positive ones as Lovecraft himself grew to accept, more and more, those parts of him-
self which he had been unable to bear before then. Thus his description of “the color out of
space” in the story of the same name certainly has the flavor of colors that might be
appropriate to Pluto.
In this connection, it is of interest that some of the survivors of the destruction of
Nagasaki by “The Fat Man,” a nuclear device using plutonium‡ for fuel, re ported “seeing”
the fireball of the nuclear blast that leveled that city by what could only be direct stimulation
of the brain from radiation emitted by the nuclear detonation, without mediation by the eyes
or other intervening sensory organs. These survivors were completely blind, many of them
from birth; yet they described the awful climbing pillar of primordial nuclear fire unleashed
by the Bomb in terms unmistakable to those of us familiar with images of nuclear explosions
and their aftermath from newspapers, television, and other visual media. Their perceptions
seemed to include something like color, as well. And one of them referred to the light from
the blast which she perceived this way as the “Death-Light.” Whatever colors these blind
survivors of the nuclear destruction of Nagasaki saw in this way, however they perceived the
Bomb’s “Death-Light,” surely all these would qualify as the colors and the light of Pluto.
Because of Pluto’s association with the Bomb, the colors of Cherenkov and gamma
radiation, are associated with Him.‡‡

*Liber 777, Columns XV-XVIII.

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 281.

†Oken, op. cit., p. 231.

††Watters, op. cit., pp. 55-58. While she does not explicitly refer to the conditions ruled by Neptune as
entropic, the ones she cites are either entropic by nature or the results of entropic processes, e.g.,
diffusion, junk (“where the original integrity of things is lost through breakage, wear and tear,
dissolution”; ibid., p. 56), impotence, bankruptcy, etc.

‡The “Thin Man,” the nuclear device that destroyed Hiroshima, employed uranium as its fuel.
‡‡Cherenkov radiation (also spelled Cerenkov or Čerenkov) is electromagnetic radiation emitted when a
charged particle (such as an electron) passes through an insulator at a constant speed greater than the
speed of light in that medium. The charged particles polarize the molecules of that medium, which
then turn back rapidly to their ground state, emitting prompt radiation. The characteristic blue glow
of nuclear reactors is due to Cherenkov radiation. It is named after Russian scientist Pavel
Alekseyevich Cherenkov, the 1958 Nobel Prize winner who was the first to characterize it rigorously.
Gamma radiation, also known as gamma rays (denoted as γ), is electromagnetic radiation of high
frequency (very short wavelength). They are produced by sub-atomic particle interactions such as
electron-positron annihilation, neutral pion decay, radioactive decay, fusion, fission or inverse
Compton scattering in astrophysical processes. Gamma rays typically have frequencies above 1019
Hz, and therefore have energies above 100 keV and wavelength less than 10 picometers, often smaller
than an atom. Gamma radioactive decay photons commonly have energies of a few hundred keV, and
are almost always less than 10 MeV in energy. Because they are a form of ionizing radiation, gamma
rays can cause serious damage when absorbed by living tissue, and are therefore a health hazard.

Patterns and compounds of color:

Patterns:

Pluto rules heavy straight lines and sharp angles in complex combinations.
Pluto also rules mushroom and toadstool shapes (both because of the shape of nuclear
and thermonuclear detonation clouds and because of the properties of psychedelic mush -
rooms – not to mention mushrooms which as the Death-Angel which are not only highly
psychotropic in extremely small doses, but deadly in doses any larger than those!).

Forms, shapes, lineal figures, geomantic figures, figures related to pure number, and
numerological associations:

Under Key 1, Pluto rules the Point, because it consists of exactly one thing (the
Point itself), and the Circle, because it is the most perfect figure, therefore representative
of Ultimate Godhead. Under Key 31, He rules all Geomantic figures of the Fiery
Triplicity: Puer, for Aries; Fortuna Major and Fortuna Minor, for Leo; and Acquisitio,
for Sagittarius. Of curves, Pluto rules heavy straight lines and sharp angles, in complex
combinations, as previously mentioned.

Magick Square or other device for making sigils:

The Mystic Rose of 22 Petals

 Any scalar (a 1 x 1) square is a trivial case of a Magick Square

Gods:

Nota bene: The Gods and Goddesses of Fire must be regarded as perhaps the most
human of the Gods, strange as that must seem. Fire made us what we are now,
evolutionarily and culturally; it enabled us to claim power over the whole living world, and,
via the culinary arts, metallurgy, and the use of fire for the preparation of medications, take
charge of our morphological, technological, and biochemical evolution. They are ambiguous
Gods, though, Their gift of Fire to us both a blessing and a curse, and Their reflection in
human psychodynamics reflects that ambiguity. The Gods and Goddesses of Death are much
less human than the deities of Fire, but as destructive as fire on Earth can be, They are
nevertheless linked to the deities of Fire via Fire’s various roles as Destroyer, Undertaker (by
means of funeral pyres), Driver of Game, and Preparer of the Land for the Plow, all of which
either entail death or reflect humanity’s terrible power over the biosphere, or both.

Greek:

Hades, Lord of the Underworld

Phorkys, God of Death
Tartaros, Spirit of the Monstrous Deep
Iacchus (equivalent to Samadhi)
Plouton, Lord of Wealth (particularly of buried and sunken treasures)
Thanatos, Lord of Death
Hekate, Lord of Works of Maleficence and Black Magick, and of Crossroads
Hermes, as the Greek Psychopompos as well as the Lord of Crossroads and Black
Magick; Hephaestos, Lord of the Forge.
Rhadamanthys, Minos, and Aiakos (Ae’acus) were the three judges of the dead,
underworld demigods of the underworld. They were originally mortal men, sons of the
God Zeus, who were granted their position after death as a reward for the establishment
of law on earth. Aiakos was the guardian of the keys of the Haides and the judge of the
men of Europe, Rhadamanthys was lord of Elysion and judge of the men of Asia, and
Minos was the judge of the final vote. Some say there was a fourth judge, Triptolemos,
who presided over the souls of the Initiates of the Mysteries. The mortal lives of the
three netherworld Judges is not detailed here. The name of Aiakos was appropriately
derived from the Greek words aiaktos, aiazô, meaning wailing and lamentation. (The
world of the dead, ruled by Hades and Persephone, located either underground or in the
far west beyond the inhabited regions. It was separated from the land of the living by the
rivers Styx (hateful), Lethe (forgetfulness), Acheron (woeful), Phlegethon (fiery), and
Cocytus (wailing). The newly arrived dead were ferried across the Styx by the avaricious
old ferryman Charon, whom they paid with the coin that was placed in their mouths
when they were buried. Unauthorized spirits who tried to enter or leave Hades were
challenged by the fearful dog Cerberus. The honey cake that the Greeks buried with the
dead was intended to quiet him. All the dead drank of the river of forgetfulness. The
judges of the dead – Minos, Aeacus, and Rhadamanthus – assigned to each soul its
appropriate abode. The virtuous and the heroic were rewarded in the Elysian Fields, or
Elysium (in Greek religion and mythology, the Elysian Fields/Elysium was a blessed
afterlife for heroes favored by the Gods. Identified with the Fortunate Isles or Isles of the
Blessed, Elysium was situated in the distant West, at the edge of the world).
Wrongdoers were sent to Tartarus (Tartarus, in Greek mythology, was the lowest region
of the underworld, where the wicked (e.g., Sisyphus, Tantalus, and Ixion) were sent as
punishment for their sins. Most souls wandered as dull, tenebrous shades among fields
of asphodel.)
Minos (Greek: Μίνως) was a mythical king of Crete, son of Zeus and Europa. After
his death, Minos became a judge of the dead in Hades.
Rhadamanthus (Ραδάμανθυς; also transliterated as Rhadamanthys or
Rhadamanthos) was a son of Zeus and Europa, and brother of king Minos of Crete
(Hom. Il. xiv. 322), or, according to others, a son of Hephaestos (Paus. viii. 53. § 2).
From fear of his brother he fled to Ocaleia in Boeotia, and there married Alcmene. In
consequence of his justice throughout life, he became, after his death, one of the judges
in the lower world, and took up his abode in Elysium. (Apollod. iii. 1. § 2, ii. 4. § 11;
Hom. Od. iv. 564, vii. 323; Pind. Ol. ii. 137.) Rhadamanthus was a wise king, the son
of Zeus and Europa. Later accounts even make him out to be one of the judges of the
dead. His brothers were Sarpedon and Minos (also a king and later a judge of the dead).
Rhadamanthus was raised by Asterion. He had two sons, Gortys and Erythrus.
According to later legends (c. 400 BC), on account of his inflexible integrity he was
made one of the judges of the dead in the lower world, together with Aeacus and Minos.
He was supposed to judge the souls of Asians, Aeacus those of Europeans, while Minos
had the casting vote (Plato, Gorgias, 524A).
Ae’acus (Aiakos) was a son of Zeus and Aegina, a daughter of the river-God
Asopus. He was born in the island of Oenone or Oenopia, whither Aegina had been
carried by Zeus to secure her from the anger of her parents, and whence this island was
afterwards called Aegina. (Apollod. iii. 12. § 6; Hygin. Fab. 52; Paus. ii. 29. § 2; comp.
Nonn. Dionys. vi. 212; Ovid Met. vi. 113, vii. 472, &c.). After his death Aeacus became
one of the three judges in Hades (Ovid Met. xiii. 25; Hor. Carm. ii. 13. 22), and
according to Plato (Gorg. p. 523; compare Apolog. p. 41; Isocrat. Evag. 5) especially for
the shades of Europeans. In works of art he was represented bearing a scepter and the
keys of Hades. (Apollod. iii. 12. § 6; Pind. Isthm. viii. 47, &c.)
Hestia: Fire Goddess. Hestia is the Goddess of the sacred fires of the hearth, the
heart of spiritual and emotional stability in your home. Her cult goes back to the 7th
century BC.
Hephaestos Fire God (Greek) or Vulcan (Roman/Italian): Hephaestus (also
Hêphaistos or Hephaestos) is the God of fire and the forge, and the patron God of
blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans, and sculptors. He was known as Vulcan in the Roman
pantheon. Hephaestos was a Greek God whose Roman equivalent was Vulcan. Yhe son
of Zeus and Hera, He was the God of technology, blacksmiths, craftsmen, artisans,
sculptors, metals, metallurgy, fire, and volcanoes. Like other mythic smiths, but unlike
most other gods, Hephaestos was lame, which gave him a grotesque appearance. (This
reflected the practice among early human communities of laming their smith so that he
wouldn’t abscond, taking his expertise and Magick away with him; they compensated
him for that by giving the loveliest woman of the community to him to marry, and
keeping him well-supplied with the best food and other commodities and services.) He
served as the blacksmith of the gods, and he was worshiped in the manufacturing and
 industrial centers of Greece, particularly in Athens. The center of his cult was in
Lemnos. Hephaestos’s symbols are a smith’s hammer, an anvil and a pair of tongs,
although sometimes he is portrayed holding an axe.

Sicily:

Adranus or Adranos (Greek: ‘Αδρανός) was a fire God worshipped by the Sicels,
the original inhabitants of the island of Sicily. His worship occurred all over the island,
but particularly in the town of Adranus, modern Adrano, near Mount Etna. Adranus
himself was said to have lived under Mount Etna before being driven out by the Greek
God Hephaestos, or Vulcan. According to Aelian, about a thousand sacred dogs were
kept near his temple in this town. According to Hesychius, Adranus was said to have
been the father of the Palici, born to Adranus’s lover, the nymph Thalia. Some modern
commentators have suggested that Adranus may have been related to the similarly-
named gods Adar and Adramelech (respectively from Persia and Phoenicia), Who were
also personifications of the Sun or of fire in general.

Roman:

Pluto/Pluton, Lord of the Underworld, and of Wealth

Proserpina, wife of Pluto and Queen of the Underworld
Orcus, Lord of Death
Vulcan, Lord of the Forge. Vulcan (Latin: Vulcanus), a.k.a. Mulciber, is the God of
beneficial and hindering fire, including the fire of volcanoes in ancient Roman religion
and Roman Neopaganism. He is known as Sethlans in Etruscan mythology. He was
worshipped at an annual festival on August 23 known as the Volcanalia. The God
belongs to the most ancient stage of Roman religion: Varro citing the Annales Maximi,
recalls that king Titus Tatius had dedicated altars to a series of deities among which
Vulcan is mentioned. Vulcan was identified with the Greek God of fire and smithery,
Hephaestos.
Dis, Lord of Hell.
Vesta: Fire Goddess. Vesta is the Goddess of the sacred fires of the hearth, the
heart of spiritual and emotional stability in your home. Her cult goes back to the 7th
century BC.
Cacus: a fire-breathing monster and the son of Vulcan. He lived in a cave in the
Palatine Hill in Italy, the future site of Rome. To the horror of nearby inhabitants, Cacus
lived on human flesh, and would nail the heads of victims to the doors of his cave. He
was eventually overcome by Hercules.

Etruscan:

In Etruscan mythology, Sethlans was the God of fire, the forge, metalworking, and
by extension craftsmanship in general, the equivalent, though their names share no
etymology, to Greek Hephaestos and the Roman Vulcan. Sethlans is one of the
indigenous Etruscan gods. In Etruscan arts Sethlans may be identified by his tools, the
hammer and tongs of the blacksmith, and by the pileus or conical cap he wears.

Egyptian:

Anubis, Lord of the Dead

Maat, the Vulture-Goddess of Wisdom
Djehuti, Judge of the Dead, and Psychopompos (He Who conducts the spirits of the
newly dead down to the realms of the Afterlife)
Osiris, the Dying God
Typhon
Kephra, God of Regeneration and Hidden Wealth (His image is the dung-beetle;
Pluto rules waste, sewage, feces, etc.)
Asar
 Hammemit.

Akkadian:

Gerra is the Babylonian and Akkadian God of fire, derived from the earlier
Sumerian deity Gibil. He is the son of Anu and Antu.
Ishum is a minor God in Akkadian mythology, the brother of Shamash and an
attendant of Erra. He may have been a God of fire and, according to texts, led the gods
in war as a herald but was nonetheless generally regarded as benevolent. Ishum is
known particularly from the Babylonian legend of Erra and Ishum. He developed from
the Sumerian figure of Endursaga.
Gibil: In Sumerian mythology, Gibil is the God of fire, variously the son of An and
Ki, An and Shala or of Ishkur and Shala. He later developed into the Akkadian God
Gerra. In some versions of the Enûma Eliš, Gibil is said to maintain the sharp point of
weapons, have broad wisdom, and possess a mind “so vast that all the Gods, all of them,
cannot fathom it.” Some versions state Gibil, as lord of the fire and the forge, also
possesses the wisdom of metallurgy.

Assyria:

Nusku was the name of the light and fire-God in Babylonia and Assyria, who is
hardly to be distinguished, from a certain time on, from a God Girru - formerly Gibil.
Nusku-Girru is the symbol of the heavenly as well as of the terrestrial fire. As the former
he is the son of Anu, the God of heaven, but he is likewise associated with Enlil of
Nippur as the God of the Earth and regarded as His first-born son. A center of His cult
in Assyria was in Harran, where, because of the predominating character of the moon-
cult, he is viewed as the son of the Moon-God Shin. Nusku-Girru is by the side of Ea,
the God of water, the great purifier. It is He, therefore, Who is called upon to cleanse the
sick and suffering from disease, which, superinduced by the demons, was looked upon
as a species of impurity affecting the body. The fire-God is also viewed as the patron of
the arts and the God of civilization in general, because of the natural association of all
human progress with the discovery and use of fire. As among other nations, the fire-God
was in the third instance looked upon as the protector of the family. He becomes the
mediator between humanity and the gods, since it is through the fire on the altar that the
offering is brought into the presence of the gods. While temples and sanctuaries to
Nusku-Girru are found in Babylonia and Assyria, he is worshipped more in symbolical
form than the other gods. For the very reason that his presence is common and universal
he is not localized to the same extent as his fellow-deities, and, while always
enumerated in a list of the great gods, his place in the systematized pantheon is more or
less vague. The conceptions connected with Nusku are of distinctly popular origin, as is
shown by his prominence in incantations, which represent the popular element in the
cult, and it is significant that in the astro-theological system of the Babylonian priests
Nusku-Girru is not assigned to any particular place in the heavens.

USA:
The French Enlightenment: Madame La Guillotine
Celtic:

Lugh, God of Fire

Cernunnos - The ‘Horned God’, God of Nature, Animals, Fertility and the
Underworld
Cerridwen - Moon Goddess, Goddess of Dark Prophecy and the Underworld
The Triple Goddess - The Maiden, Mother and Crone all at once. Moon, Creator,
Destroyer
Badb (Irish) - Goddess of War, Death and Rebirth
Morgan Le Fay (Welsh) - Goddess of Death, Fate, the Sea and of Curses
Rhiannon (Welsh) - Goddess of Birds, Horses, Enchantments, Fertility and the
Underworld
 Skatha (Welsh) - Goddess of the Underworld, Darkness, Magic, Prophecy and
Martial Arts
Brigid/Brigit/Brighid, Goddess of Fire (Celtic): Some of Brigid’s titles include
‘Fire of Inspiration’, ‘Fire of the Hearth’ and ‘Fire of the Forge’. Brigid is a complex
and contradictory fire goddess, a patroness of a range of practical and inspired wisdom.
Belenus (also Belenos) was a deity worshipped in Gaul, Britain and Celtic areas of
Austria and Spain. He had shrines from Aquileia on the Adriatic to Kirkby Lonsdale in
England. The name’s etymology is unclear. Suggestions include “shining one” and
“henbane god.” He may be the same deity as Belatu-Cadros. In the Roman period He
was identified with Apollo. His consort was Belisama. His name has been found on
around fifty inscriptions. These are mainly concentrated in Aquileia and Cisalpine Gaul,
but also extend into Gallia Narbonensis, Noricum, and far beyond. (In ancient Gaul and
Britain, Apollo may have been equated with fifteen or more different Celtic names and
epithets (notably Grannos, Borvo, Maponus, Moritasgus and others).)
In classical Celtic polytheism, Grannus (also Granus Mogounus Amarcolitanus)
was a deity associated with spas, healing thermal and mineral springs, and the sun. He
was regularly identified with Apollo as Apollo Grannus. He was worshipped chiefly in
Upper Germany and northern Gaul, not infrequently in conjunction with Sirona, Mars
and other deities.

Basque:

Eate: A storm-God worshipped by the ancient Basques and other Iberians.

According to some sources, He is also the God of fire.

Hindu:

Kali: Kali, or the dark goddess, is the fearful and ferocious form of the mother
Goddess Durga. She is depicted as having born from the brow of Goddess Durga during
one of her battles with the evil forces. Kali is represented with perhaps the fiercest
features amongst all the world’s deities. Her tongue protrudes from her mouth, her eyes
are red, and her face and breasts are sullied with blood. She stands with one foot on the
thigh, and another on the chest of her husband, Shiva.
Shiva, the Destroyer, Kali’s husband.
Agni: The Fiery One, God of Fire: The stories and myths surrounding Agni are
fascinating and contradictory. Fire God Agni is worshipped in three forms; fire on earth,
lightning and the sun. Agni is a Hindu deity, one of the most important of the Vedic
gods. He is the God of fire and the acceptor of sacrifices. The sacrifices made to Agni go
to the deities because Agni is a messenger from and to the other gods. He is ever-young,
because the fire is re-lit every day, and also immortal. Agni, the Vedic God of fire who
presides over the earth, has made the transition into the Hindu pantheon of gods,
without losing his importance. With Vayu and Indra, who presided over the air and sky,
he is one of the supreme gods in the Rig Veda. The link between heaven and earth, he is
associated with Vedic sacrifice, taking offerings to the other world in the fire. His
vehicle is the ram. His cult survived the change of the ancient fire worship into modern
Hinduism. The sacred fire-drill (agnimathana) for procuring the temple-fire by friction
– symbolic of Agni’s daily miraculous birth – is still used.
Yama, God of Death: Yama is the much-feared Hindu God of death who lives in
his gloomy palace Kalichi situated somewhere in the nether regions or the Hindu Patala.
He is the regent of the Southern quarter of the compass. Yama has a number of
attendants to assist him in his many tasks. In his palace he keeps a register called the
“Book of Destiny” in which each person’s span of life is recorded. This is maintained by
one of the god’s attendants and the servant is predictably as gloomy of countenance as
his master. When a person’s span of life is over Yama sends some of his more robust
attendants up to earth to haul the person down to his palace. Sometimes, when things
are not lively enough down in Kalichi, Yama himself ascends riding on his buffalo, his
steed of choice, and carrying in one hand a heavy mace to strike down the victim with
and in another a noose to drag the hapless person down to his palace. There the dead
 man or woman’s soul is made ready to pass in judgment before Yama, who sits on his
throne in a great hall in his terrifying palace. Chitragupta, one of Yama’s better-known
attendants, reads out of a great book the sum of the soul’s virtues and sins. Yama judges
the dead person on this basis and he assigns the soul accordingly to either one of his
many hells, a mete fate for inveterate sinners, or to the abode of the Pitris (The Pitris are
the forefathers and their abode is tantamount to heaven to a Hindu who is reconciled
with his or her forefathers in this place. Only a very virtuous person is allowed to enter
the abode of the Pitris.). If the person has been rather moderate on Earth and is neither a
great sinner nor a great virtuoso then he or she is sent back to Earth by Yama to have
another try at striving to enter the abode of the Pitris. Since most Hindus are not fond of
dying many ways have been devised to try and elude Yama and his untimely summons.

Buddhism:
Voudon:
SubGenius:

“Bob,” in His Osirian (Martyr) avatar

The Smith Gods
NheeGhee

Discordianism/Erisianism:

The closest thing to a Devil that this religion has is Greyface. The Curse of
Greyface is one of the most important parts of Discordianism. It features prominently on
several pages of the Principia Discordia. According to the Principia, Greyface was a
man who lived in the year 1166 BC and taught that life is serious and play is sin. The
curse is the psychological and spiritual imbalance that results from these beliefs, both
individually and within groups, nations, and civilizations. The Curse: Greyface
encouraged his followers to “Look at all the order around you” (Principia Discordia page
00042), and somehow convinced mankind to agree with his ideas about Serious Order.
The Principia notes that it is something of a mystery why Greyface gained so many
followers when anyone could have looked at all of the disorder in the world. Greyface
and his followers took the game of playing at life more seriously than they took life itself
and were known even to destroy other living beings whose ways of life differed from
their own. – Malaclypse the Younger, Principia Discordia, Page 00042
For more information, see, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discordianism

H. P. Lovecraft:

Yuggoth, Spirit of the Planet Pluto

Nyarlathotep, He Who Reveals the Starry Wisdom
Cthulhu, Who dwells in dark R’lyeh on the benthic plains of the Pacific Ocean.**

Stephen King:
LaVeyan Satanism:
Szekely (Romany Gypsy):
Chinese:

Yeng-Wang-Yeh - Lord of Judgment and Death

In Chinese folk religion and Chinese mythology, the Kitchen God, named Zao Jun
(Chinese: 灶君; Pinyin: Zào Jūn; literally “stove master”) or Zao Shen (Chinese: 灶神;
Pinyin: Zào Shén; literally “stove god” or “stove spirit”), is the most important of a
plethora of Chinese domestic gods that protect the hearth and family with the addition
of being celebrated in Vietnamese culture as well. It is believed that on the twenty third
day of the twelfth lunar month, just before Chinese New Year he returns to Heaven to
report the activities of every household over the past year to the Jade Emperor (Yu
Huang). The Jade Emperor, emperor of the heavens, either rewards or punishes a family
based on Zao Jun’s yearly report.
Japanese:

Shinigami ( 死 神 ?, “death spirit”) is the personification of death that evolved in

Japan, having been imported to Japan from Europe during the Meiji period. This image
of death was quickly adopted and featured in such works as the rakugo play Shinigami
and in Shunsen Takehara’s Ehon Hyaku Monogatari (One-hundred Story Picture-
Book). After giving birth to the Fire God Hinokagutsuchi, the Goddess Izanami dies
from wounds of its fire and enters the perpetual night realm called Yomi-no-kuni (the
underworld) that the gods retire to and where Izanagi, her husband, travels to in a failed
attempt to reclaim her. He discovers his wife as not-so beautiful anymore, and, in a brief
argument afterwards between them, she promises to take a thousand lives every day,
signifying her position as the Goddess of death. Another popular death personification
is Enma (Yama), also known as 閻 魔 王 (Enma Ou) and 閻 魔 大 王 (Enma Daiou)
meaning “King Enma”, or “Great King Enma” which are direct translations of Yama
Rājā. He originated as Yama in Hinduism and later became Yanluo in China and Enma
in Japan. Compare Chinese Buddhism. Enma rules the underworld, which makes him
similar to Hades, and he decides whether someone dead goes to heaven or to hell. A
saying parents use to scold children is that Enma will cut off their tongue in the afterlife
if they lie.
Kagu-tsuchi or Kagutsuchi (カグツチ?), also called Kagutsuchi no kami (迦具土の
神?), Hinokagutsuchi ( 火之迦具土 ?), or Homusubi ( 火産霊 ?), is the kami of fire in
Japanese mythology. Kagu-tsuchi’s birth burned his mother Izanami, causing her
death. His father Izanagi, in his grief, beheaded Kagu-tsuchi with his sword, Ame no
Ohabari ( 天 之 尾 羽 張 ), and cut his body into eight pieces, which became eight
volcanoes. The blood that dripped off Izanagi’s sword created a number of deities,
including the sea God Watatsumi and rain God Kuraokami. Kagu-tsuchi’s birth, in
Japanese mythology, comes at the end of the creation of the world and marks the
beginning of death. In the Engishiki, a source which contains the myth, Izanami, in her
death throes, bears the water God Mizuhame, instructing her to pacify Kagu-tsuchi if he
should become violent. This story also contains references to traditional fire-fighting
tools: gourds for carrying water and wet clay and water reeds for smothering fires.
Kōjin, also known as Sambō-Kōjin or Sanbō-Kōjin (三宝荒神?): the kami (God) of
fire, the hearth, and the kitchen. He is sometimes called Kamado-gami, literally the God
of the stove. He represents violent forces that are turned toward the good of humankind.
The name Sambō-Kōjin means “three-way rough deity,” and He is considered a God of
uncertain temper. Fire, which He represents, is a destructive force, as shown in the
myth of Kagu-tsuchi, the original fire deity, whose birth caused his mother’s death.
However, Kōjin embodies fire controlled and turned toward a good purpose. He is said
to destroy all impurity. He is also responsible for watching over the household and
reporting any misdeeds to the kami of the village or city. These reports are discussed,
and the according rewards or punishments assigned, by an assembly of gods in Izumo
province in the tenth month of the traditional lunar calendar. Kōjin is sometimes
identified as an incarnation of Fudō Myō-Ō, who is likewise depicted as surrounded by
flames and tasked with dealing with misdeeds. As Kamado-gami, he is sometimes
depicted as female.

Judaism:

The Angel of Death: According to the Midrash, the angel of death was created by
God on the first day of Creation. His dwelling is in heaven, whence he reaches earth in
eight flights, whereas pestilence reaches it in one. He has twelve wings. “Over all people
have I surrendered thee the power,” said God to the angel of death, “only not over this
one which has received freedom from death through the Law.” It is said of the angel of
death that he is full of eyes. In the hour of death, he stands at the head of the departing
one with a drawn sword, to which clings a drop of gall. As soon as the dying man sees
the angel, he is seized with a convulsion and opens his mouth, whereupon the angel
throws the drop into it. This drop causes his death; he turns putrid, and his face becomes
yellow. The expression “to taste of death” originated in the idea that death was caused
by a drop of gall.
Various personifications of the Angel of Death include Azrael; Samael, Archangel
of Death and Destruction ; and Satan:

Azrael is the name of the Archangel of Death in some extrabiblical traditions.

He is also the angel of death in Islamic theology. It is an English form of the Arabic
name Azra’il (‫ )عزرائيل‬or Azra’eil (‫)عزرایل‬, the name traditionally attributed to the
angel of death in Islam and Sikhism, as well as some Hebrew lore. The Qur’an
never uses this name, referring instead to Malak al-Maut (which translates directly
as angel of death). It is also spelled Izrail, Azrin, Izrael, Azriel, Azrail, Ezraeil,
Azraille, Azryel, or Ozryel. Chambers English dictionary uses the spelling Azrael.
The name literally means Whom God Helps.
Samael (Hebrew: ‫( )סמאל‬also Sammael, perhaps “Venom of God”) is an
important archangel in Talmudic and post-Talmudic lore, a figure who is accuser,
seducer and destroyer, and has been regarded as both good and evil. It is said that
he was the guardian angel of Esau and a patron of the empire of Rome. Also called
Sammael and Samil, legends say that he is both a member of the heavenly host
(with often grim and destructive duties) and a fallen angel, equatable with Satan
and the chief of the evil spirits. One of Samael’s greatest roles in Jewish lore is that
of the angel of death. In this capacity he is a fallen angel but nevertheless remains
one of the Lord’s servants. As a good angel, Samael supposedly resides in the
seventh heaven, although he is declared to be the chief angel of the fifth heaven.
Satan (Hebrew: ‫שדָט ן‬
ָ‫רׂד‬, ‫ ַה‬ha-Satan (“the accuser”); Persian “sheytân”; Arabic:
‫ الشيطان‬ash-Shayṭān (“the adversary”) - both from the Semitic root: Ś- Ṭ-N) is an
embodiment of antagonism that originates from the Abrahamic religions, being
traditionally considered a “fallen” angel in Judeo-Christian belief, and a Jinn in
Islamic belief. Originally, the term was used as a title for various entities (humans,
accusing angels, etc.) that challenged the religious faith of humans in the Hebrew
Bible. Since then, the Abrahamic religions have used “Satan” as a name for the
Devil. (Lucifer is a Latin word (from the words lucem ferre), literally meaning
“light-bearer”, which in that language is used as a name for the dawn appearance of
the planet Venus, heralding daylight. Use of the word in this sense is uncommon in
English, in which “Day Star” or “Morning Star” are more common expressions. In
English, “Lucifer” generally refers to the Devil, although the name is not applied to
him in the New Testament. The use of the name “Lucifer” in reference to a fallen
angel stems from an interpretation of Isaiah 14:3–20, a passage that speaks of a
particular Babylonian King, to whom it gives a title that refers to what in English is
called the Day Star or Morning Star (in Latin, lucifer), as fallen or destined to fall
from the heavens or sky. In 2 Peter 1:19 and elsewhere, the same Latin word lucifer
is used to refer to the Morning Star, with no relation to the devil. However, in post-
New Testament times the Latin word Lucifer has often been used as a name for the
devil, both in religious writing and in fiction, especially when referring to him
before he fell from Heaven.)

The “Angel of the Lord” smites 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp (II Kings
19:35). When the Angel of Death passes through to smite the Egyptian first-born, God
prevents “the destroyer” (shâchath) from entering houses with blood on the lintel and
side posts (Exodus 12:23). The “destroying angel” (mal’ak ha-mash ḥit) rages among
the people in Jerusalem (II Sam. 24:16). In I Chronicles 21:15 the “angel of the Lord” is
seen by King David standing “between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword
in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem.” The biblical Book of Job (33:22) uses the
general term “destroyer” (memitim), which tradition has identified with “destroying
angels” (mal’ake Khabbalah), and PrOvid 16:14 uses the term the “angels of death”
(mal’ake ha-mavet). Azra’il is sometimes referred as the angel of death as well.
The memitim are a type of angel from biblical lore associated with the mediation
over the lives of the dying. The name is derived from the ancient Hebrew word mĕmītǐm
and refers to angels that brought about the destruction of those whom the guardian
 angels no longer protected. While there may be some debate among religious scholars
regarding the exact nature of the memitim, it is generally accepted that, as described in
the Book of Job 33:22, they are killers of some sort.
The Archangel Michael (literally, “Who Is Like God”), defender of the Throne of
God: Michael (Hebrew: ‫ִמצ־ידָכֵאל‬, Micha’el or Mîkhā’ēl; Greek: Μιχαήλ, Mikhael; Latin:
Michael or Míchaël; Arabic: ‫ميخائيل‬, Mikhaḗl) is an archangel in Hebrew, Christian and
Islamic tradition. He is viewed as the field commander of the Army of God. He is
mentioned by name in the Book of Daniel, the Book of Jude, and the Book of
Revelation, in which he leads God’s armies against Satan’s forces during his uprising.
In the book of Daniel, Michael appears as “one of the chief princes” who in Daniel’s
vision comes to the Archangel Gabriel’s aid in his contest with the angel of Persia
(Dobiel). Michael is also described there as the advocate of Israel and “great prince who
stands up for the children of your [Daniel’s] people.” In Hebrew, the name Michael
means “who is like El (God)”, which in Talmudic tradition is posed as a rhetorical
question: “Who is like God?” to imply that no one is like God. Much of the late
Midrashic detail about Michael was transmitted to Christianity through the Book of
Enoch, whence it was taken up and further elaborated. In late medieval Christianity,
Michael, together with Saint George, became the patron saint of chivalry, and of the
first chivalric order of France, the Order of Saint Michael of 1469. In the British
honours system, a chivalric order founded in 1818 is also named for these two saints, the
Order of St Michael and St George. St Michael is also considered in many Christian
circles as the patron saint of the warrior. Police officers and soldiers, particularly
paratroopers and fighter pilots, regard him as their patron. He is also a patron of
Germany, the City of Brussels and Kiev. Roman Catholics and Anglicans refer to him
as Saint Michael the Archangel and also simply as Saint Michael. Orthodox Christians
refer to him as the Taxiarch Archangel Michael or simply Archangel Michael.
‫היהא‬, the First Emanation, the Logos
‫( ןיש‬Shin; the spirit of the Hebrew letter)

Christianity:

Satan (Lucifer, Mephistopheles), as Lord of the Underworld.

In the New Testament, the fourth horseman of Revelation 6 is called Death and is
pictured with Hades following him.
In Dante’s Inferno, the three judges of the souls of the damned are

Islam:

Azrael is the name of the Archangel of Death in some extrabiblical traditions. He is

also the angel of death in Islamic theology. It is an English form of the Arabic name
Azra’il (‫ )عزرائيل‬or Azra’eil (‫)عزرایل‬, the name traditionally attributed to the angel of
death in Islam and Sikhism, as well as some Hebrew lore. The Qur’an never uses this
name, referring instead to Malak al-Maut (which translates directly as angel of death). It
is also spelled Izrail, Azrin, Izrael, Azriel, Azrail, Ezraeil, Azraille, Azryel, or Ozryel.
Chambers English dictionary uses the spelling Azrael. The name literally means Whom
God Helps.
Shaitan (‫ )شيطان‬is the equivalent of Satan in Islam. While Shaitan ( ‫شيطان‬, from the
root šṭn ‫ )شط(ن‬is an adjective (meaning “astray” or “distant”, sometimes translated as
“devil”) that can be applied to both man (“al-ins”, ‫ )السنس‬and Jinn, Iblis is the personal
name of the Devil who is mentioned in the Qur’anic account of Genesis. According to
the Qur’an, Iblis (the Arabic name used) disobeyed an order from Allah to bow to Adam
and as a result was forced out of heaven and given respite until the day of judgment
from further punishment. When Allah commanded all of the angels to bow down before
Adam (the first Human), Iblis, full of hubris and jealousy, refused to obey God’s
command (he could do so because, as a jinn, he had free will), seeing Adam as being
inferior in creation due to his being created from clay as compared to him (created of
fire). “It is We Who created you and gave you shape; then We bade the angels prostrate
 to Adam, and they prostrate; not so Iblis (Lucifer); He refused to be of those who
prostrate.” (Allah) said: “What prevented thee from prostrating when I commanded
thee?” He said: “I am better than he: Thou didst create me from fire, and him from
clay.” (Qur’an 7:11-12) It was after this that the title of “Shaitan” was given, which can
be roughly translated as “Enemy,” “Rebel,” “Evil” or “Devil.” Shaitan then claims that
if the punishment for his act of disobedience is to be delayed until the Day of Judgment,
that he will divert many of Adam’s own descendants from the straight path during his
period of respite. God accepts the claims of Iblis and guarantees recompense to Iblis and
his followers in the form of Hellfire. In order to test mankind and jinn alike, Allah
allowed Iblis to roam the earth to attempt to convert others away from his path. He was
sent to earth along with Adam and Eve, after eventually luring them into eating the fruit
from the forbidden tree.

Norse:

Loki, the mischievous Spirit of Fire: Loki is a God or jötunn (or both). (A jötunn
(Old Norse jōtunn, anglicized as jotunn or jotun) is a giant in Norse mythology, a
member of a race of nature spirits with superhuman strength, described as sometimes
standing in opposition to the races of the tribes of the Æsir (the principal groups of Gods
of the pantheon of Norse paganism) and Vanir (In Norse mythology, the Vanir (singular
Vanr) are a group of gods associated with fertility, wisdom, and the ability to see the
future. The Vanir are one of two groups of gods (the other being the Æsir) and are
associated with the location Vanaheimr. After the Æsir–Vanir War, the Vanir became a
subgroup of the Æsir and are subsequently sometimes also referred to as members of the
Æsir), although they frequently mingle with or intermarry with these. Their
otherworldly homeland is Jötunheimr, one of the nine worlds of Norse cosmology,
separated from Midgard, the world of humans, by high mountains or dense forests.
Other place names are also associated with them, including Niflheimr, Utgarðr and
Járnviðr. In some legends and myths they are described as having the same height as
humans.) Loki is the son of Fárbauti and Laufey, and the brother of Helblindi and
Býleistr. By the jötunn Angrboða, Loki is the father of Hel, the wolf Fenrir, and the
world serpent Jörmungandr. By Sigyn, Loki is the father of Nari and/or Narfi. The
stallion Svaðilfari as the father, Loki gave birth – in the form of a mare – to the eight-
legged horse Sleipnir. In addition, Loki is referred to as the father of Váli in the Prose
Edda. Loki’s relation with the gods varies by source. Loki assists the gods, and
sometimes causes problems for them. Loki is a shape shifter and in separate incidents he
appears in the form of a salmon and a mare. Loki’s positive relations with the gods ends
with his role in engineering the death of the god Baldr. Loki is eventually bound by the
gods with the entrails of one of his sons. A serpent drips venom from above him that his
wife Sigyn collects into a bowl. However, Sigyn must empty the bowl when it is full, and
the venom that drips in the mean time causes Loki to writhe in pain, thereby causing
earthquakes. During the events of Ragnarök, Loki is foretold to fight against the gods
among the forces of the jötnar. There, he will encounter the god Heimdallr and the two
will slay each other. Loki is attested in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century
from earlier traditional sources; the Prose Edda and Heimskringla, written in the 13th
century by Snorri Sturluson; the Norwegian Rune Poem, in the poetry of skalds, and in
Scandinavian folklore. Loki may be depicted on the Snaptun Stone, the Kirkby Stephen
Stone, and the Gosforth Cross. Scholars have proposed theories about the origins and
development of Loki, the implications of the lore surrounding him, a possible
connection between Loki and air or fire, and that he may be the same figure as the god
Lóðurr.
Hel: Hel presides over a realm of the same name, where She receives a portion of
the dead. Hel is attested in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier
traditional sources, and the Prose Edda, written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson.
In addition, She is mentioned in poems recorded in Heimskringla and Egils saga that
date from the 9th and 10th century respectively. An episode in the Latin work Gesta
Danorum, written in the 12th century by Saxo Grammaticus, is generally considered to
refer to Hel, and Hel may appear on various Migration Period bracteates. In the Poetic
 Edda, Prose Edda, and Heimskringla, Hel is referred to as a daughter of Loki, and to “go
to Hel” is to die. In the Prose Edda book Gylfaginning, Hel is described as having been
appointed by the god Odin as ruler of a realm of the same name, located in Niflheim. In
the same source, her appearance is described as half-black and half-flesh colored, and as
further having a gloomy, down-cast appearance. The Prose Edda details that Hel rules
over vast mansions, Her servants in Her underworld realm, and as playing a key role in
the attempted resurrection of the god Baldr.

Albania:

Verbti is a deity of storm and fire in northern Albanian mythology. His name means
“the blind one.” He was also known as Shën Verbti (“the holy blind one”) or, in some
parts of Albania, as Rmoria.

Slavic/Slavonic:

Krsnik or Kresnik: A fire God. Kresnik is a pagan deity also known as Svarožič,
son of the Slavic sun God Svarog, described as having golden hair and golden hands.
From being a divinity, Kresnik evolved into a Slovenian national hero who lives on a
golden mountain, sometimes as a deer with golden antlers. As a human, he is a great
king skilled with magic, but who interests himself in farming. In some tales he even
fights off the Mongols as a peasant youth. The comparative mythology showed that this
demiGod figure originates from Iranian God Yima and his double, Indian Yama, with
whom they share many common characteristics. It is a very diverse deity with many
different faces depending on the location of the myth.
Peklenc (also spelled Pekelnyboh, Pekelnypan, Pekelnik, Lokton): A chthonic deity
of Slavic mythology. He is the lord of the underground and a divine judge, analogous to
Hades and Pluto. Peklenc mastered the subterranean fire by which metals and precious
stones were forged. He also reigned over the underground water which, according the to
ancient Slavic traditions, caused earthquakes when Peklenc ordered it to reach the
surface. Peklenc had a wholesale knowledge about the deeds of wicked, who were
carried next to him to be judged and punished. He was a severe though equal judge, as
he provided everybody with the possibility to redeem their past mistakes. The ones who
persisted were condemned to death or condemned to punishments depending by their
crimes. The cruel were turned into stones, the quarrelsome became werewolves, while
the ones who had no compassion towards the others were turned into creatures feeding
on their very bodies. Peklenc was also capable to punish entire peoples by opening deep
ravines that swallowed villages and cities, a pond or a lake was left in their place. The
inhabitants paid for their punishment by wondering underwater, their desperate scream
being transmitted by Oźwiena, the Goddess of echo. Peklenc also sent evil spirits against
unjust governors, in order to have them abandon their reigns. The latter ruined and,
covered back by grass, returned to nature. He could also use basilisks as emissaries or
servants.
In Slavic mythology, Perun (Cyrillic: Перун) is the highest God of the pantheon
and the God of thunder and lightning. His other attributes were the fire, mountains, the
oak, iris, eagle, firmament (in Indo-European languages this was joined with the notion
of the sky of stone), horses and carts, weapons (the hammer, axe (Axe of Perun) and
arrow) and war. He was first associated with weapons made of stone and later with those
of metal. Like Germanic Thor, Perun is described as a rugged man with a copper beard.
He rides in a chariot pulled by a goat buck and carries a mighty axe, or sometimes a
hammer. The axe is hurled at evil people and spirits and will always return to his hand.
Of all historic records describing Slavic gods, those mentioning Perun are the most
numerous. As early as 6th century, he was mentioned in De Bello Gothico, a historical
source written by the Byzantine historian Procopius. A short note describing beliefs of a
certain South Slavic tribe states they acknowledge that one god, creator of lightning, is
the only lord of all: to him do they sacrifice an ox and all sacrificial animals. While the
name of the God is not mentioned here explicitly, the fact that word Perun in a number
of Slavic languages today simply means “thunder” or “lightning bolt” is proof enough
 this was a reference of him. In 980, when prince Vladimir the Great came to throne of
Kiev, he erected statues of five pagan gods in front of his palace. Perun was chief among
these, represented with a silver head and a golden moustache. Vladimir’s uncle Dobrinja
also had a shrine of Perun established in his city of Novgorod. After the Christianization
of Kievan Rus, this place became a monastery, which, quite remarkably, continued to
bear the name of Perun. Perun is not mentioned directly in any of the records of
Western Slavic paganism, but a reference to him is perhaps made in a short note in
Helmod’s Chronica Slavorum, written in latter half of the 12th century, which states
(quite similarly to Procopius some six centuries earlier) that Slavic tribes, even though
they worship many various gods, all agree there is a supreme God in heaven which rules
over all other on earth. This could be a reference to Perun, but since he is not named,
nor any of his chief attributes (thunder or lightning) mentioned, we cannot be certain.
Moreover, the name of Perun is also commonly found in Southern Slavic toponymy. The
Bulgarian people believe that the name of the mountain Pirin, one of the highest
mountains of the Balkan Peninsula, was named after Perun. There are also places called:
Perun, Perunac, Perunovac, Perunika, Perunička Glava, Peruni Vrh, Perunja Ves,
Peruna Dubrava, Perunuša, Perušice, Perudina and Perutovac. These names today
mostly represent mountain tops, but in medieval times, large oaks, sacred groves and
even entire villages or citadels were named Perun. Also, as mentioned already, in
Ukrainian perun and in Polish piorun means “thunderbolt.” Among South Slavs, a
mountain plant Iris germanica is known in folklore as perunika (“Perun’s plant”) and
sometimes also as bogisha, (“god’s plant”), and was believed to grow from ground that
had been struck by lightning.
Svarog (Old Church Slavonic: Сваро́гъ) is a Slavic deity known primarily from the
Hypatian Codex, a Slavic translation of the Chronicle of John Malalas. Svarog is there
identified with Hephaestus, the God of the blacksmith in ancient Greek religion, and as
the father of Dažbog, a Slavic solar deity. On the basis of this text, some researchers
conclude that Svarog is the Slavic God of celestial fire and of blacksmithing.

Hungarian:
African:

Yoruba:

Aganju: The Orisha of volcanoes, the wilderness, and the river (An Orisha
(also spelled Orisa or Orixa) is a spirit or deity that reflects one of the
manifestations of Olodumare (God) in the Yoruba spiritual or religious system). He
is associated with Saint Christopher. As the third Òrìsà said to have come to earth,
Aganjú is an Òrìsà of great antiquity. Lukumi followers of this religion believe that
Aganjú is a force that, like the Sun that is his symbol, is essential for growth, as
well as a cultivator of civilizations. Like the volcano with which He is also
associated, He forms the foundation upon which societies are built, and is the
catalyst for the production of vast amounts of wealth and commerce needed for
advanced development. He is most highly regarded by Lukumi practitioners for his
role in assisting humans in overcoming great physical as well as psychological
barriers. Like the volcano, Aganjú is noted for his legendary strength and his ability
to bring about drastic change. His significance in Cuba in the past is most probably
due in part to the fact that he was said to have delivered people out of bondage and
helped one to carry the heaviest of burdens. Aganju is heavily associated with
Shango, with some stating that he is Shango’s father, if not at least his brother. (In
Yoruba religion, Sàngó (also spelled “Sango” or “Shango,” often known as Xangô
or Changó in Latin America and the Caribbean, and also known as Jakuta) is
perhaps the most popular Orisha; He is a Sky Father, God of thunder and
lightning. Sango was a royal ancestor of the Yoruba, as He was the third king of
the Oyo Kingdom. In the Lukumí (Olokun mi = “my dear one”) religion of the
Caribbean, Shango is considered the center point of the religion, since He
represents the Oyo people of West Africa. All the major initiation ceremonies, as
performed in Cuba, Puerto Rico and Venezuela for the last few hundred years, are
 based on the traditional Shango ceremony of Ancient Oyo. This ceremony survived
the Middle Passage and is considered to be the most complete to have arrived on
Western shores. This variation of the Yoruba initiation ceremony became the basis
of all Orisha initiations in the West.) Aganju has been associated with Oshun, with
whom He had a relationship, as well as with Yemoja. Aganju is associated with the
shoulder, and has a strong, powerful, and determined character. He is considered
“one heart” with Oya and is received by all of Shango’s, Oshun’s, and Oya’s
children.
In Haitian Vodou and Yoruba mythology, Ogun (or Ogoun, Ogun, Ogou,
Ogum) is a loa and orisha Who presides over fire, iron, hunting, politics and war.
He is the patron of smiths and is usually displayed with His attributes: machete or
sabre, rum and tobacco. He is one of the husbands of Erzulie and is a husband of
Osun and Oya and friend to Eshu in Yoruba mythology. Ogun is the traditional
warrior and a powerful God of metal working, analogous to Ares and Hephaestos in
Greek mythology and Visvakarma in Hindu mythology. In Brazil, He is
represented with Saint George. Ogun is mighty, powerful, triumphal, yet also
exhibits the rage and destructiveness of the warrior whose strength and violence
cannot turn against the community He serves. Perhaps linked to this theme is the
new face he has taken on in Haiti, which is not quite related to His African roots,
that of a powerful political leader. He gives strength through prophecy and Magick.
It is Ogun who is said to have planted the idea, led and given power to the slaves for
the Haitian Revolution of 1804. He is called now to help people obtain a
government more responsive to their needs.

Southeast Asia:
Oceania:

Auraka (“The All-Devouring”) (Polynesia): A deity of death.

Dengei/Degei (Melanesia/Fiji): The Serpent-God, a judge in the Land of the Dead.
In Fijian mythology, Degei is the Serpent-God in the Kauvadra hills. After death the
soul faces a long journey from the sunny land of the living to the cold, misty Land of the
Dead. Degei will interrogate the souls as soon as they arrive. Idle men, whose nails are
long, will be punished. Industrious souls will be rewarded. After judgment the soul will
be thrown into a deep lake. It will sink for a long time until it reaches Murimuria, a sort
of Purgatory. There some will be rewarded and others will receive dire punishment.
Only a few are chosen by the gods - arbitrarily, it seems - to go to Burotu, the land of
eternal life and joy, where they will rest in the cool shade.
Hine-nui-te-po: Goddess of the Night, of Darkness and Death. Hine is actually a
universal Goddess with many functions. She is represented with two heads, night and
day. One of her functions is as patroness of arts and crafts. She loved Tuna the fish-man,
out of whose head grew the first coconut.
Limu (Polynesia): God of the Dead.
Papa (or Enua, Hotu-Papa, Whenua): Mother earth, wife of Rangi, first woman. In
Hawaii, Goddess of the Underworld. The earth, a goddess, and the first woman in
Polynesian mythology. Her husband is variously called Wakea, Vatea or Tangi. Some
traditions relate that this first couple came to Hawaii from the Society Islands in a canoe
with two pigs, two dogs and two fowls. Others relate that their original homeland was
Ilolo (Jilolo) or Ololoi in the Moluccas, now part of Indonesia. This name, Muluka or
Moloka (“‘Molucca” ), was the origin of the name of Molokai, one of the Hawaiian
islands.
Ratu-mbati-ndua (Fiji): The God of hell. A man with only one tooth, with which he
devours the dead.
Pele (Hawaii): Goddess of fire and the volcano.
Samulayo: God of death in battle.
Whiro: The Maori Lizard-God of the Dead, who lives in the dark misty
Underworld and inspires evil thoughts in the minds of people.
Ta’aroa (Kanaloa), Lord of Storms, God of Hell and the Abyssal Deeps of Ocean;*
Pere (Pele), Goddess of Volcanoes, Fire, Forges, and Engineers, and wife of Ta’aroa
General European personification of death: The Grim Reaper, equipped with a scythe with
which he mows down the living. This image of death gained great popularity during
and after the Black Plague ravaged Europe in the 14 th century.
Native Australian:
Voudon: Baron Samedhi
Eskimo:
Central American:
American Indian:
Aztec:

Xiuhtecuhtli (“Turquoise Lord” or “Lord of Fire”): the God of fire, day and heat.
He was the lord of volcanoes, the personification of life after death, warmth in cold
(fire), light in darkness and food during famine. He was also named Cuezaltzin
(“flame”) and Ixcozauhqui, and is sometimes considered to be the same as Huehueteotl
(“Old God”), although Xiuhtecuhtli is usually shown as a young deity. His wife was
Chalchiuhtlicue. Xiuhtecuhtli is a manifestation of Ometecuhtli, the Lord of Duality,
and according to the Florentine Codex Xiuhtecuhtli was considered to be mother and
father of the Gods, who dwelled in the turquoise enclosure in the center of earth. The
Nahuatl word xiuhuitl means “year” as well as “turquoise” and “fire”, and Xiuhtecatl
was also the God of the year and of time. In the 260-day ritual calendar, the deity was
the patron of the day Atl (“Water”) and with the trecena 1 Coatl (“1 Snake”).
Xiuhtecuhtli was also one of the nine Lords of the Night and ruled the first hour of the
night, named Cipactli (“Alligator”). Xiuhtecuhtli was the patron God of the Aztec
emperors, who were regarded as his living embodiment at their enthronement. The deity
was also one of the patron gods of the pochteca merchant class. Stone sculptures of
Xiuhtecuhtli were ritually buried as offerings, and various statuettes have been recovered
during excavations at the Great Temple of Tenochtitlan with which he was closely
associated. Statuettes of the deity from the temple depict a seated male with his arms
crossed. A sacred fire was always kept burning in the temples of Xiuhtecuhtli. In
gratitude for the gift of fire, the first mouthful of food from each meal was flung into the
hearth.
Xolotl: the God with associations with both lightning and death. Although often
depicted in relation to the underworld, Xolotl was not a Psychopomp in the Western
sense. Xolotl did, however, aid the dead on their journey to Mictlan, the afterlife in
some myths. Xolotl was also the God of fire and of bad luck. He was the twin of
Quetzalcoatl, the pair being sons of the virgin Coatlicue, and was the dark
personification of Venus, the evening star. He guarded the sun when it went through the
underworld at night. He also assisted Quetzalcoatl in bringing humankind and fire from
the underworld. In art, Xolotl was depicted as a skeleton, a dog-headed man or a
monster animal with reversed feet. He was also the patron of the Mesoamerican
ballgame. He is identified with Xocotl as being the Aztec God of fire. Xoloitzcuintle is
the official name of the Mexican Hairless Dog (also known as Perro Pelón Mexicano in
Spanish), a canine breed endemic to Central America dating back to Pre-Columbian
times. This is one of many native dog breeds in the Americas and it is often confused
with the Peruvian Hairless Dog. The name Xoloitzcuintle makes reference to Xolotl
because, mythologically, one of this dog’s missions was to accompany the dead in their
journey into eternity. In spite of this prominent place in the mythology, the meat of the
Xoloitzcuintle was very much part of the diet of some of the ancient peoples of the
region.
Mixcoatl (Nahuatl: Mixcōhuātl, “cloud serpent”), or Camaxtli: God of the hunt,
identified with the Milky Way, the stars, and the heavens in several Mesoamerican
cultures. He was the patron deity of the Otomi, the Chichimecs, and several groups that
claimed descent from the Chichimecs. While Mixcoatl was part of the Aztec pantheon,
His role was less important than that of Huitzilopochtli, Who was their central deity.
Under the name of Camaxtli, Mixcoatl was worshipped as the central deity of
Huejotzingo and Tlaxcala. Mixcoatl is represented with a black mask over his eyes and
distinctive red and white “candy-cane stripes” painted on his body. These features are
 shared with Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli, the Lord of the Dawn, God of the morning star.
Unlike Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli, Mixcoatl can usually be distinguished by his hunting
gear, which included a bow and arrows, and a net or basket for carrying dead game.
Mixcoatl was one of four children of Tonacatecuhtli, meaning “Lord of Our
Sustenance,” an aged creator god, and Cihuacoatl, a fertility Goddess and the patroness
of midwives. Sometimes Mixcoatl was worshipped as the “Red” aspect of the God
Tezcatlipoca, the “Smoking Mirror,” who was the God of sorcerers, rulers, and warriors.
In one story, Tezcatlipoca transformed himself into Mixcoatl and invented the fire drill
by revolving the heavens around their axes, bringing fire to humanity. Along with this
cosmic fire drill, Mixcoatl was the first to strike fire with flint. These events made
Mixcoatl a God of fire as well as of war and the hunt. Mixcoatl was the father of 400
sons, collectively known as the Centzon Huitznahua, who ended up having their hearts
eaten by Huitzilopochtli. The Centzon Huitznahua met their demise when they, and
their sister Coyolxauhqui, after finding their mother Coatlicue pregnant, conspired to
kill her. However, as they attacked she gave birth to a fully formed and armed
Huitzilopochtli, who proceeded to kill his half-siblings. Mixcoatl was also related to 400
more gods, the Centzonmimixcoa, whom, together with his 3 brothers (all different from
the ones named above) and their sister, he slew by ambush. Mixcoatl was also thought of
as being the father of another important deity, Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent.
Quetzalcoatl’s father Mixcoatl was murdered; Quetzalcoatl was informed by
Cozcaquauhtli that “the uncles who had killed his father were Apanecatl, Zolton, and
Cuilton.”

Maya:

Huracan (also Hurakan), in Mayan understandable as Jun Raqan (“one legged”,

often referred to as U K’ux Kaj ‘Heart of Sky’): a Mayan God of wind, storm, and fire,
and one of the creator deities who participated in all three attempts at creating
humanity. He also caused the Great Flood after the second generation of humans
angered the gods. He supposedly lived in the windy mists above the floodwaters and
repeatedly invoked “earth” until land came up from the seas. His name, understood as
‘One-Leg’, suggests God K of Postclassic and Classic Maya iconography, a God of
lightning with one human leg and one leg shaped like a serpent. God K is commonly
referred to as Bolon Tzacab and K’awiil or Kauil. The name may ultimately derive from
huracan, a Carib word, and the source of the words hurricane and orcan (European
windstorm). Alternative spellings are Hurakan, Harakan, Jurakan. Related deities are
Tohil, Bolon Tzacab, Cocijo in Zapotec mythology, and Tlaloc in Aztec mythology.
Jacawitz (also spelt Jakawitz, Jakawits, Q’aq’awits and Hacavitz) was a mountain
God of the Postclassic K’iche’ Maya of highland Guatemala. He was the patron of the
Ajaw K’iche’ lineage and was a companion of the sun God Tohil. It is likely that he
received human sacrifice. The word jacawitz means “mountain” in the lowland Maya
language, and the word q’aq’awitz of the highland Maya means “fire mountain”, which
suggests that Jacawitz was mainly a fire deity, much like Tohil. In the Mam language,
the similar word xq’aqwitz means “yellow wasp” and the wasp was an important symbol
of the deity and its associated lineage. In the Cholan languages, jacawitz means “first
mountain.”, linking the God with the first mountain of creation.
Tohil (also spelt Tojil) was a deity of the K’iche’ Maya in the Late Postclassic
period of Mesoamerica. At the time of the Spanish Conquest, Tohil was the patron God
of the K’iche’.Tohil’s principal function was that of a fire deity and he was also both a
sun God and the God of rain. Tohil was also associated with mountains and he was a
God of war, sacrifice and sustenance. In the K’iche’ epic Popul Vuh, after the first
people were created, they gathered at the mythical Tollan, the Place of the Seven Caves,
to receive their language and their gods. The K’iche’, and others, there received Tohil.
Tohil demanded blood sacrifice from the K’iche’ and so they offered their own blood
and also that of sacrificed captives taken in battle. In the Popul Vuh this consumption of
blood by Tohil is likened to the suckling of an infant by its mother. Because of his
association with human sacrifice, Tohil was one of the first deities that the Spanish
clergy tried to eradicate after the Conquest.
Huichol/Wixáritari:

Tatewari, in Huichol folklore, is the God of fire, called by them ‘grandfather fire’.
He is also the shaman of ancient times, the patron of all shamans. Amongst his actions
are burning the fields so that they are reading for the planting of crops, he helps the
Huichol hunt deer and, as the representation of fire, cooks food. As part of his shaman
duties, he accompanies shamans when they go to cure a sick person. Feathers act as his
messengers, which are generally worn on the stick of shamans. (The Huichol or
Wixáritari are an indigenous ethnic group of western central Mexico, living in the
Sierra Madre Occidental range in the Mexican states of Nayarit, Jalisco, Zacatecas, and
Durango. They are best known to the larger world as the Huichol, however, they refer to
themselves as Wixáritari (“the people”) in their native Huichol language. The adjectival
form of Wixáritari and name for their own language is Wixárika.)

American folklore: The Grim Reaper (also a Saturnian figure)

Science-fiction:
Neil Gaiman’s Endless:

The Endless, characters in the graphic novels of Neil Gaiman, are primordial
powers behind all human experience and affairs. There are seven of them, each of
whom can be associated with one of the five planets or two Lights of classic astrology:

Lord Dream – Luna

Lady Death – Mercury
L. Desire – Venus (the gender of that members of the Endless is ambiguous)
Lord Destiny – Sol
Lord Destruction – Mars
Lady Delirium/Delight – Jupiter
Lady Despair – Saturn

The separate influences of the trans-Saturnian planets are all reflected in the classic
astrological assignments if Saturn, so, in a sense, Lady Despair might be said to also
represent Pluto as well as Neptune and Uranus. On the other hand, Lady Death has a
function similar to that of Mercury and Hermes, that of the Psychopompos; as such, she
is associated with Death and thus with Pluto. But otherwise Pluto is not represented
among the Endless.

Terry Pratchett’s Discworld:

Death: Dressed in a black robe and armed with a scythe, he rides out on his white
horse Binky to find the newly dead and escort them to whatever fate awaits them.
Mort: Death’s temporary assistant, and husband of Ysabell, Death’s adopted
daughter. Mort, short for Mortimer, is the title character in Mort. He is first seen as the
overly-thoughtful son of a farmer in the Octarine Grass Country, near the Ramtops.
Having proved himself unworthy as a scarecrow he is chosen by Death to be his
apprentice. Mort is described as being very tall and skinny, with muscles like knots in
string. He has a shock of bright red hair, and walks as if he is made entirely of knees.
Mort starts off at the bottom, learning to accept his position while mucking out the
stables, and trying to ignore Ysabell. When Death feels in need of a break, Mort takes
over The Duty. Unfortunately for Mort, his feelings for a teenage princess get in the way
of his job and he starts off a chain reaction of events by impulsively preventing her
assassination. Reluctant to tell his master about his gaffe, he tries various unsuccessful
methods to fix the situation. After fighting and losing to Death, Mort was given an extra
lease of life when the Grim Reaper turned over his Lifetimer. This allowed Mort to stay
in the world of the living. After the events of Mort, Mort leaves Death’s service and
marries Ysabell. The couple are given the title of Duke and Duchess of Sto Helit, and
later also become the parents of Susan Sto Helit. They subsequently meet their end after
 a freak accident sends their carriage plunging into a ravine, as revealed in Soul Music.
They had discussed this with Death and had turned down his offer to extend the
duration of their existence on the grounds that it wouldn’t be the same as actually
lengthening their lives.
Susan Sto Helit: Susan Sto Helit (also spelled Sto-Helit), once referred to as Susan
Death, is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series of fantasy novels.
She is the “granddaughter” of Death, the Disc’s Grim Reaper, and, as such, has
“inherited” a number of his abilities. She has to date appeared in three Discworld
novels: Soul Music, Hogfather, and Thief of Time. She is also referenced (though not by
name) at the end of Mort, when her father invites Death to her christening. She is one of
the Discworld series’ principal protagonists. Being both human and supernatural, Susan
is frequently (and reluctantly) forced away from her “normal” life to do battle with
various malign supernatural forces or, barring that, to take on her grandfather’s job in
his absence. Death tends to employ her in his battles against the Auditors of Reality,
particularly in situations where he has no power or influence. As the series progresses,
she also begins to take on roles educating children, so that, as Pratchett mentions in The
Art of Discworld, she has “ended up, via that unconscious evolution that dogs [his]
characters, a kind of Goth Mary Poppins.”
Albert: Albert (originally known as Alberto Malich) is Death’s manservant, butler,
and cook. Once a wizard and founder of the Unseen University, he attempted to gain
immortality by reciting the Rite of AshkEnte (a ritual to summon Death) backwards,
believing this would force Death to stay away from him. However, this instead brought
him directly to Death’s Domain. Since time in Death’s Domain does not flow in the
same way as it does on the Discworld, Albert succeeded, in a way, at gaining
immortality. Before returning to the world during Mort, “Albert” had 91 days, three
hours and five minutes of Time left on the Disc, most of which he spent shopping and
using the soap and baths at the “Young Men’s Reformed Cultist of the Ichor-God-Bel-
Shamharoth’s Association” (Death is not very good at making plumbing). As of
Hogfather, he has only a few seconds left, and can no longer leave Death’s side. Albert
is a highly idiosyncratic cook, believing everything needs to be fried to get rid of the
germs, including porridge.

The Land of Oz:

Roquat the Red, a.k.a. Ruggedo, the Nome King (in Baum’s novels in the series;
later, Ruth Plumley Thompson and artist John R. Neill used the traditional spelling for
“gnome,” so that the novel that Ruggedo is the title character in Thompson’s The
Gnome King of Oz). In Baum’s universe, the Nomes are immortal rock fairies who
dwell underground. They hide jewels and precious metals in the earth, and resent the
“upstairs people” who dig down for those valuables. Apparently as revenge, the Nome
King enjoys keeping surface-dwellers as slaves – not for their labor, but simply to own
them. In Tik-Tok of Oz, using some personal magic, Ruggedo has enslaved the Shaggy
Man’s brother, a miner from Colorado. Shaggy, with the help of Betsy Bobbin, the
Oogaboo army, some of Dorothy’s old friends, and Quox the dragon, conquer the Nome
King again and Tititi-Hoochoo, the Great Jinjin expels him from his kingdom, placing
Chief Steward Kaliko on the throne. (In Rinkitink in Oz, which is a revision of a lost
1905 novel titled King Rinkitink, which, had it been published, would have been the
original character’s debut, Kaliko behaves much like his former master.)
The Nomes, the denizens of the underground realm ruled over by Roquat/Ruggedo
and, at one point, Kaliko. Ruggedo rules over the secret treasures of the Underworld.

*In some ways, the Polynesian God Ta’aroa or Kanaloa (the former is the Tahitian var iant, the latter is
Hawaiian) is equivalent to Poseidon/Neptune because of His Lord ship over the great oceanic
deeps. But the Polynesians believe Hell to lie at the bottom of the deep ocean, and since Ta’aroa
is Lord of those deeps, He is thus also the Polynesian equivalent of Hades. His consort, Pere or
Pele, Who is also a Disean God because of Her Lordship over the inner fires of the Earth, is also
 His sister; in some ways, She corresponds functionally to Persephone, but the mythology
describing Her and Her brother/husband Ta’aroa differs in many important ways from the
Graeco-Roman mythology of Hades/Pluto and Persephone/Proserpina.

**While Cthulhu is associated with Poseidon/Neptune because of His associations with the Sea, He is also
Disean, because He dwells in the deep oceanic abysses, has a less than pleasant attitude
concerning humanity, and is a being of enormous power. See the discussions concerning Ta’aroa
(Kanaloa), above. In this connection, it is interesting that in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos cycle,
Cthulhu and R’lyeh are strongly associated with Polynesia and Polynesians. given Cthulhu’s
functional similarity to Ta’aroa.

World religions:

SubGenius Xist cult, cult of the resurrected “Bob”, cult of the Stark Fist of Removal
God as Zero, “Before Nothing, / Behind Nothing, / Worship it / the Zero” (as quoted from
South American native texts by Loren Eiseley, in All the Strange Hours [New York: Scribner,
1975])
Tantra
Atheism
Zen
Ninpo taijutsu (power and regenerative aspects)
Nihilism
Cult of Eleusis
Scientology (considering how many Scientologists have died under strange circumstances
while in the hands of other Scientologists, it isn’t clear whether this religion is associated with
death, the Devil, or the Underworld of Hidden Things
Bahai
Thelema (Ra-Hoor-Khuit)
SubGenius (cult of Stark Fist of Removal, power aspects, under aegis of Nuit)
Hades cults
Thuggee (Kali cults)

God-Name in Hebrew: ‫מיהלא‬

Archangel:

Thanatos

l a j y m (Mikhael, “Who Is Like God”)

Angelic Choir:

Angels:

Azrael: Angel of Death

Samael: Angel of Death
Arel: An angel of fire. His name is inscribed on the seventh pentacle of the sun. He can also
be invoked in ritual magic. Great Angel of Practicality & Common Sense.
Atar: The genius of fire.
Aha: An angel of the order of dominations, a spirit of fire used in cabalistic magical
operations.
Angels of Fire: Nathaniel, Arel, Atuniel, Jehoel, Ardarel, Gabriel, Seraph and Uriel.
Ardarel: An angel of fire.
Dalquiel: One of three princes of the third Heaven. The other two are Jabniel and Rabacyal.
All rule over fire under the ethnarchy of Anahel.
Djin: Helper of the Archangel Gabriel. He is an Elemental King, sphere of fire. He looks
somewhat elderly, yet has great muscles. He has flames for hair and is a King of Fire.
 He can teach you the ways to use fire in Magickal workings. He can also bring rituals
that you never knew existed and give them to you as gifts.
Hypezokos (Flower Of Fire): One of the “effiable, essential and elemental orders” in the
Chaldean cosmological scheme.
Jehuel: The prince of fire.
Lazai: An angel invoked in the exorcism of fire.
Mahadeo One of 11 angels with matted locks and 3 eyes that represent the Sun, Moon, and
Fire. Mahadeo also has (or had) five heads.
Metatron: Chancellor of heaven, highest power of abundance, prince of the ministering
angels. He is charged with the sustenance of mankind. He has been known as the link
between the human and the divine. The angel who wrestled with Jacob. (Genesis 32), as
the watchman (Isaiah 20) Also see Exodus 23:20 for this refers to Metatron as well.
Metatron, according to the cabala is the angel said to have lead the children of Israel
through the wilderness. His female equivalent is Shekinah. His twin brother is
Sandalphon. After arriving in heaven he was transformed into a spirit of fire and
equipped with 36 pairs of wings as well as innumerable eyes. He resides in the 7th
heaven and when evoked appears as a pillar of fire said to be more dazzling than the
sun. He has many other names that he is called by. He has also been credited with the
authorship of Psalms 37:25. He is the supreme angel of death to whom God gives daily
orders as to the souls to be taken. He then delegates these orders to his subordinates,
Gabriel and Sammael. Metatron is considered by some to be mightier than Michael or
Gabriel. Metatron is the teacher of prematurely dead children in Paradise.
Nathanael (Gift Of God): In Jewish legendary lore, Nathanael is the 6th created angel and
one of the 12 angels of vengeance. He is lord over the element of fire. He is the angel
who “burned the servants of Jair” in the contest between God and Baal, saving from fire
the 7 men who would not sacrifice to the pagan deity. In Waite, Nathanael is the angels
of the 6th hour, serving under Samil. He is also one of the 3 angels (with Ingethal and
Zeruch) set over hidden things. A legend states that it was Nathaneal who was sent from
Heaven by God to help the warrior Cerez defeat the Amorites.
Raphael(God has healed): Golden vial of balm. One of the princes of the presence and regent
of the sun. This archangel is extremely healing to all living beings. Raphael grants joy,
healing, love, miracles and grace. He inspires humankind to pray and is also protective
of travelers, guarding and guiding those who take outward or inward journeys. Raphael
also grants courage and encourages scientific breakthroughs and knowledge in general.
Essene prayer: “Raphael, Angel of Sun, enter my solar center and give the fire of life to
my whole body.”
Seraph: Singular for the term Seraphim, meaning fiery serpent. This is a name of an angel
belonging to the order of Seraphim. In Ginzberg, The Legends Of The Jews 4, 263, it is
Seraph who touches Isaiah’s lips with a live coal, an incident related in Isaiah 6:6.
Seraph is also named one of the angels with dominion over the element of fire, of which
there are quite a number.
Seruf: An angel prince set over the element of fire. He is a seraph, as his name sounds.
Uriel(Ministration): A patron angel of literature and music, Uriel bestows upon us the gift of
creative fire, as well as the power of prophecy. We appeal to him for foresight into the
future and for help in developing our psychic abilities. Uriel is an angel of
transformation, archangel of salvation, regent of the sun, overseer of Tartarus, and is the
spirit of ministration and peace. He helps turn our worst disappointments into our
greatest blessings. He is one of the angels of chance, (as in gambling), emergencies,
judgment, scroll.

Angels given by Barrett, et al.:

Olympic Planetary Spirit:

Intelligence:

Spirits given by Bardon, Barrett, et al.:

Name of Planet in Hebrew:

l w h c (ShEOL)

Commandment from Exodus.:

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of
the house of bondage.
You shall have no other gods before me.

– Exodus 20:2-3

Ten Plagues of Egypt:

Death of the First-Born Sons (Exodus 11-12).*

*This suffers in translation from the original Hebrew, which refers to the First-Born of Egypt,
i.e., the aristocracy. As it happened, the Hebrews living in captivity in Egypt just prior to the
Exodus lived in dab-and-wattle huts of very light construction, whereas the Egyptian
aristocracy lived in buildings made of heavy stone, as did their cattle. Apparently a strong
earthquake hit the region, felling the stone houses and barns of the Egyptians and killing
almost all living within them; but the flimsy, lightweight huts in which the Hebrew slaves
lived either rode out the quake undamaged, or, in those cases in which they did fall apart,
did little or no damage to anyone or anything within them.

Verses of the Creation Story from Genesis (Genesis 1-3):

Genesis 1: 1-5, 3: 2: 15-17, 3:19.

Other Biblical Verses:

The Book of Revelations (NT)

Dante’s Divine Comedy:

Cantos from the Inferno of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos VIII-XI, XXXI-XXXIII

Cantos from the Purgatorio of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos XXVII-XXXIII

Cantos from the Paradiso of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos XXVIII-XXXIII

Orders of Qlippoth:

l a I m w a t (Thaumiel, “Twins of God”)

Qlipphotic Spirit (from Kenneth Grant):

 Shalicu, whose name should be vibrated in the key of C in a sibilant and sinister
whispering, and whose sigil should be painted in vermilion on an emerald ground. This is
the path of Evocation and Pyromancy, as well as of pyromania, a sorcerous variant of Fire-
Magick.

Other Magickal Correspondences, according to Barrett, et. al.:

Day/Night of the Week ruled by Pluto:

Geocentric: Sunday night (i.e., first night of the week)

Heliocentric: First night of the week

Hours of the Day ruled by Pluto:

Geocentric: Third, tenth, seventeenth, and twenty-fourth* hour of the first night of the
week. In general, Pluto rules any hour of the night immediately preceding one ruled by
Neptune and following one ruled by Persephone.

Heliocentric: Same.

*Above the Arctic and Antarctic Circles, for six months of the year there is no daylight, and consequently
each “day” (twenty-four hour period, the beginning of which is defined by the timing of dawn at
lower latitudes in the same time-zone) of Winter there is one long night immediately followed and
preceded by another such night. So each such 24-hour “night” does contain a seventeenth and a
twenty-fourth hour, unlike nights at latitudes below the Arctic and Antarctic Circles, which are
interrupted by daylight and contain, on average, only 12 hours.

Grade of the Temple:

10º = 1π , Ipsissimus (Third Order)

Article of Bill of Rights:

Article I

Religious establishment prohibited. Freedom of speech, of the press, and right

to petition.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting

the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or of the
right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress
of grievances.

Buddhist meditation:

Liber 777: For Key 31, it gives Fire.*

Liber 777: For Key 31-bis, it gives Breathing.*

*Liber 777, Column XXIII.

 Magickal Power: The Great Work; talismans; crystal-gazing (scrying)

Foods, drugs, flavors, and perfumes::

Onycha, myrrh
For mineral drugs, Liber 777 gives nitrates, for Key 31, and carbon, for Key 31-bis.*
For vegetable drugs, it gives stramonium (jimson weed) for Key 31-bis. For perfumes, it
gives ambergris, olibanum (frankincense), and all fiery odors (suggesting Fire) for Key 31.†
De Vore gives “the so-called aromatic flavors, in which solubility releases both taste and
aroma.” ††
Plutonian drugs include all poisons, because these kill; homeopathic tinctures made
from Plutonian substances, especially in dilutions of x31* or other number associated with
Pluto; drugs which allow the mind to catch glimpses of unknown and alien realms, or which
enable one explore it Magickally; and nutrients which revitalize and regenerate the body,
such as vitamins C and E and other anti-oxidants, the B vitamins, and the trace-elements
zinc and selenium.
Water from artesian wells serves as a perfect Plutonian drug, not only because it comes
from underground, the dominion of Hades, but because it is a priceless treasure, wealth
whose value is reckoned on orders of the sort associated with Pluto. Without water, there
can be no Earthly life; with water, even the starkest and most barren of deserts can bloom.
Without water, nothing else has value to us; water is the bedrock of all Life’s values, the
ultimate measure of our health, well-being, and all our wealth. Therefore water in any form
is ruled by Pluto, and artesian water, above all. So pure artesian well water is one of the best
of all possible drugs to use for all Workings associated with Pluto. (For similar reasons,
sewer-water, homeopathically triturated to x31 (diluted with pure water , one part of sewer-
water to one hundred parts pure water, and shaken by hand, this process then being repeated
30 times.)††
Plutonian foods include anything cooked with fire; anything with a fiery hot taste, such
as peppers and curries; and dishes prepared from the tissues of Plutonian plants and/or
animals, or from those parts of the body ruled by Pluto, such as the genitalia and the brain.‡
(Carrion also qualifies as a Plutonian food – but. unless you happen to be a hyena or a
saprophyte, except in cases of true desperation, that’s going just a tad too far.)
Myrrh qualifies as both a perfume and a drug. As a perfume, it has been used for ages
as a mortuarial preservative, embalming agent, and counter-oderant, to preserve the flesh of
a corpse against rot and to mask or cancel out the odor of death during funerals and burials.
As a drug, it has been successfully used for countless centuries to treat a number of
dysfunctions, including pyorrhea, halitosis, septic ulcers, asthma, bronchial and lung
diseases, chronic catarrh, spongy gums, hemorrhoids, and piles.
Crack cocaine is a Plutonian drug par excellence, though I do not recommend using it
other than in the form of a homeopathic preparation of at least x31 dilution. It is said to
give a heady feeling of power; it is closely associated with power-politics and organized
crime; and it kills, either directly, due to unpleasant side-effects of long-term use, or
indirectly, e.g., as a result of the gang warfare so often associated with the crack economy in
big cities. Methamphetamine is another Plutonian drug, even more dangerous than cocaine,
with strong ties to organized crime (a Plutonian way of life).

*Liber 777, Column XLIV.

**Ibid., Column XLIII.

†ibid., Column XLII.

††De Vore, op. cit., p. 281.

††Homeopathic preparations are produced by adding to one part of the original substance 100 parts pure
water, by volume, in a test-tube or other container that fits into the hand easily and can be securely
stopped with a cork or lid. It is then shaken up by hand in the original container. Apparently, this
has to be done such that the preparation is within the electromagnetic field as sociated with a living
organism, or the result isn’t successful.
One part of the result is then drawn off, put into a container, and diluted with 100 parts of pure
water, then shaken up by hand, as before. This repeated for a number of times that depends upon the
sort of effect it is desired that the drug have; this number, n, is indicated by the symbol “x n,” where
n is the number of dilutions of the original substance in pure water after the manner described above.
Since every such dilution of the original substance leaves one part of substance to every 102 parts
pure water, n such dilutions of the original substance leave one part of substance to every 10 2n parts
water. Just twelve such dilutions leaves one part of original substance to every 10 24 pure water, at
which point, your are, as a friend of mine so aptly put it, “screwing around with Avogadro’s
Number.” Avogadro’s Number, approximately equal to 6.02 x 10 23, is the number of molecules of a
substance in a gram-molecular weight of that substance. With just one part or gram-molecular
weight of a substance left per 10 24 gram-moles of water, there is effectively less than one molecule of
the substance per gram-mole of preparation; since it is not possible to have less than one molecule of
anything, this means that at that there are no physical molecules of the original substance at all left in
the preparation, only pure water.
Yet somehow homeopathic preparations, even those prepared with many more than twelve
dilutions of the original substance, do work. They work so well, in fact, that veterinarians have
employed them successfully as medicines for their sick non-human charges – under double-blind
conditions, so that the veterinarian him- or herself could not possibly have known whether the medi-
cine being used was the real thing or a placebo!
For more on homeopathic preparations, see Chapter 1 of Part 4 of Volume III of this work,
“Homeopathic Preparations of Qaballistically Coordinated Elixirs for Use as Drugs in Magickal
Workings.”

‡In all animal life endowed with central nervous systems, the brain is, after all, by far and away, one of
the biggest sex-organs in the body. In Homo sapiens and most other primates, it is the biggest
such.

Musical tone: G sharp or A flat.

Legendary orders of being:

Liber 777 gives Salamanders for Key 31, and Socratic Genius for Key 31-bis. (The
entries for Key 32, “Ghuls, larvae, and corpse-candles,” and Key 32-bis, “The Dweller at the
Threshold, Gnomes” also seem to fit here, as well.)*
Cerberus, the three-headed dog who guards the exits from the Underworld is associated
with Pluto.
The Phoenix, who cremates itself alive every thousand years and then arises, reborn,
from its own ashes is ruled by Pluto.
In addition, many Lovecraftian entities, such as the ghouls, ghasts, and night-gaunts
described in many of his stories, are Plutonian in nature. So are L. Frank Baum’s Nomes,
because of the nature of their kingdom and attitudes.

*Liber 777, Column CLXXXIII.

Alchemical and Pythagorean Associations:

 The Element Fire
The Alchemist himself
Putrefaction
Transmutation

Metals, stones, gems, elements, and minerals: Plutonium (Pu, atomic number 94); chemical
elements beyond Lawrencium (Lr, atomic number 103)

Liber 777 gives the fire opal.*

Oken gives plutonium, jade, ceramics, enamels, and beryl. **
De Vore gives beryl, sardonyx, jade, cloisonné enamels, ceramics, plutonium,
tungsten, synthetics, and plastics.†
Pluto rules all power-metals, being the generic ruler of power in any form, great
wealth, and radioactive materials of all kinds.
As the ruler of great wealth and buried treasure in any form, Pluto rules all pre cious
metals or jewels which have been hidden away, whether by accident or design. But he
also rules the true mineral wealth of the soil, i.e., its mineral content, without which
plants would starve and die. Those soils which are best for the fussiest of plants,
containing the highest quality nutrients, are premier examples of Pluto’s dominion over
the mineral kingdom. But in a sense he rules over all minerals, sharing that dominion
with Saturn.
Sol rules gold, and Luna rules silver. Pluto, Their higher octave, thus rules the
artificial element berkelium (Bk, atomic number 97), a member of the actinide series,
since this is a heavier analog (higher octave?) of elements 47 (silver) and 79 (gold).
This element is a radioactive version of a noble metal, reflecting Pluto’s representation
of the Solar Phoenix and its reflection in the Magickal power of Luna. Platinum is
another candidate for a metal of Pluto, as it is still another noble metal, akin to sil ver
and gold.
Pluto rules volcanism, and therefore its products. Thus lavas, basalts, and gran ites
are all Plutonian. So are all volcanic glasses, such as obsidian. Mafic and ultramafic
rocks, which are high in manganese, are likewise volcanic, and therefore ruled by Pluto.
And sulfur in any form is strongly associated with volcanoes and the Underworld, hence
with Pluto.
Pluto also rules the artificial chemical elements beyond the Neptunian actinides,
beginning with element 104 (lawrencium).
Pluto rules artificial stones of all kinds, such as the Herkimer diamond, ar tificial
star sapphires, etc.
Since most of the world’s surface water was originally liberated from deep stra ta of
the Earth via volcanism, it could certainly be considered to be Plutonian in nature. The
allotropes of its ices could thus be considered to be Plutonian stones, especially Ice 7, the
seventh allotrope of water-ice to be recognized by modern science, which behaves in
some ways like a metal.

*Liber 777, Column XL.

**Oken, op. cit., p. 231.

†De Vore, op. cit., pp. 283, 286.

Plants, real and imaginary:

Liber 777:

For Key 31, it gives red poppy, hibiscus, nettle.*

 For Key 31-bis, it gives almond in flower.*

Oken gives species which come into being because of mutations caused by ra dioactive
fallout. He also gives the narcissus and cypress, because according to Greek mythology,
Hades is especially fond of these.**
The corpse-flower plant, titan arum (Amorphophallus titanium) (from Ancient Greek
amorphos, “without form, misshapen” + phallos, “penis,” and titan, “giant”) is a flowering
plant with the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world.
All herbs which have been used for embalming or for funerary ceremonies.
The cypress and poplar are mythologically associated with Hades, and the willow with
Hekate. These are all therefore associated with Pluto.
Pluto also rules plants such as legumes which revitalize the soil by fixing nitrogen in it (this
process is actually carried out by certain bacteria living in the nodes of the roots of such
plants, and these one-celled organisms are likewise Plutonian).
The herbs ginseng, gotu kola, fo ti, onions, leeks, and moly (garlic) are all Plutonian,
since they have a regenerating, revitalizing effect upon anyone who consumes them.
Pyrobotanicals: All plants which set seed when burned are ruled by Pluto. This is
especially true of the fire-selected botany of the Southern California Coastal Range and the
Northern California coastal forest region, which includes manzanita, chaparral, and
sequoias, since all of these plants are capable of starting fires in order to create optimal
conditions for reproducing as well as getting a competitive edge on other, non-fire selected
types of plants with whom they must compete in their ranges. The preferred m.o.s of these
botanical pyromaniacs include such techniques as storing up huge charges of static
electricity in their roots, thereby attracting bolts of lightning which start brushfires around
them; secreting enormous quantities of highly volatile aromatic hydrocarbons from their
leaves, saturating the air over many acres around themselves with it, generating perfect con-
ditions for the outbreak of a brushfire caused by ignition of the hydrocarbon vapors from the
first stray spark that comes along (which may be provided by lightning also drawn by the
same plant), as eucalyptus, a graceful, lovely tree native to Africa and Australia but now
found all over the world, thanks to transplants, are prone to do; and several other
frighteningly ingenious, effective tricks for seizing the ecological high ground from all
competitors. By burning the area all around themselves out to thousands of yards flat to the
ground and setting seed themselves at the same time, thereby giving their own offspring a
tremendous head start in the botanical succession land-rush following the fire over plants
which can only re-seed from outside the burned area, after the fact, these plants ensure that
their descendants will dominate whatever ecosystem evolves to fill up the burned-over area.
This deliberate, highly intelligent use of fire as a tool to secure their goals by such plants is
essentially no different than our own; the details of its use and the goals in the service of
which it is employed may differ from one case to the other, but the fact remains that these
plants are the smiths of the botanical world, as we are of ours. Since the Smith is an avatar
of Pluto, they are therefore ruled by Him, as much as human Smiths are.

*Liber 777, Column XXXIX.

**Oken, op. cit., p. 231.

Animals, Real and Imaginary:

Liber 777:

Key 31: The Lion, as the Cherub of Fire

Key 31-bis: The Sphinx, Sworded and Crowned, for Key 31-bis.*

Watters gives social insects, such as ants, bees, and termites; vermin, especially those
that live in sewers and/or carry plagues, such as rats, fleas, mosquitoes, and cockroaches;
vultures and other carrion-eaters; armored reptiles which have survived from ancient times,
such as turtles; and armadillos.**
The snake is especially representative of Pluto, because of its chthonic and mythological
attributes. The release of Kundalini energy for Magickal purposes is traditionally
symbolized by a Serpent rising up the spine to the brain, signifying the uprush of primordial
force and power in the form of sexual energy to the highest centers of mind and spirit. Also,
in the Judeo-Christian world Satan, the Christian equivalent of Hades, is often linked to a
serpent, and the Serpent that tempted Adam and Eve is usually equated by Christians with
Satan. Venomous snakes are especially Plutonian, both because their venom is so deadly
and because venoms of all kinds are ruled by Scorpio, of which Pluto is one of the mundane
rulers. In addition, snake venoms have been used in many cultures for the preparation of
both revivifying medicines and drugs to enhance Tantric Magick. Because Pluto rules both
regeneration and Tantra, for these reasons as well snakes are within Pluto’s domain.
The skunk is Plutonian, too, because of the mephitic odor of its oil. (One is tempted to
add certain unkind remarks concerning politicians, financiers, and a great many lawyers, all
of which are ruled or co-ruled by Pluto, at this point . . .) So are the little fish and birds
which pick parasites out of the mouths or from the cracks and crevices in the integuments of
much larger animals, because they thereby drag out into the light potential sources of distress
and disease from their places of hiding, and make the latter available for life’s purposes (by
eating them).
Sharks and other great animals of the oceanic abyss are also Plutonian. To the
Polynesians, who live with and on the sea the way other peoples do the land, Hell is the
realm of the great watery deeps of the sea; to them, the inhabitants of those depths are the
great demons and Elemental powers of the world. Such denizens of the depths include the
great predatory sharks, the giant squid, sperm whales, and orcas, for these are all usually
concealed from the sight or ken of land-dwellers in the depths of the sea, revealing
themselves close up usually only in moments of great terror and destruction, as in shark-
attacks and other potentially lethal events.
The orca or killer whale, named after Orcus, Roman God of Death, is Plutonian by dint
of its name, as well as its Polynesian religious connotations.
All carrion-eaters, such as hyenas, jackals, and vultures, are Plutonian. Above all, the
Plutonian animal par excellence is the Phoenix, because it perishes in a self-made fiery
holocaust which simultaneously regenerates and re-creates it.
The Salamander: The salamander is an amphibian of the order Urodela. As with many
real creatures, pre-modern authors often ascribed fantastic qualities to it (compare the
allegorical descriptions of animals in medieval bestiaries), and in recent times some have
come to identify a legendary salamander as a distinct concept from the real organism. This
idea is most highly developed in the occult. Where the two concepts can be distinguished,
the legendary salamander is most often depicted much like a typical salamander in shape,
with a lizard-like form, but it is usually ascribed an affinity with fire (sometimes specifically
elemental fire). This legendary creature embodies the fantastic qualities that ancient and
medieval commentators ascribed to the natural salamander. Many of these qualities are
rooted in verifiable traits of the natural creature but often exaggerated to a significant degree,
as was common in ancient works on natural history and philosophy. A large body of legend,
mythology, and symbolism has developed around this creature over the centuries. The most
widely known deviation from a realistic depiction is from an influential twentieth-century
occult work by Manly P. Hall, Secret Teachings of All Ages Since this illustration appears to
originate in a 1527 anti-papal tract by Andreas Osiander and Hans Sachs, where it is
identified as “the Pope as a monster,” Hall’s identification of the illustration is doubtful.
Descriptions of the legendary form are more likely to use stylized depictions. In Medieval
European bestiaries, fanciful depictions of salamanders include “a satyr-like creature in a
circular wooden tub” (eighth century), “a worm penetrating flames” (twelfth century), “a
winged dog” (thirteenth century), and “a small bird in flames” (thirteenth century).
Renaissance depictions are characteristically more realistic, adhering more closely to the
Classical description. In one of the earliest surviving descriptions of a salamander, Pliny the
Elder (A.D. 23–79) noted that the creature is “an animal like a lizard in shape and with a
body starred all over; it never comes out except during heavy showers and disappears the
moment the weather becomes clear.” All of these traits, even down to the star-like
markings, are consistent with the golden Alpine salamander (Salamandra atra aurorae) of
Europe that has golden or yellow spots or blotches on its back and some similarly marked
subspecies of the fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra). Pliny even made the important
distinction between salamanders and lizards, which are similar in shape but very different in
other respects, which was not systematized until recent times, when biologists classified
lizards as reptiles and salamanders as amphibians. Pliny recounts several other traits which
are less credible, such as the ability to extinguish fire with the frigidity of their bodies, a
quality which is also reported by Aristotle. While Pliny notes this in Book 10, Chapter 86 of
his Natural History, in Book 29, Chapter 23 of the same work he views this idea with
skepticism, pointing out that if such an idea were true, it should be easy to demonstrate. It
was never proven that these amphibians could accomplish such myths. He also notes
medicinal and poisonous properties, which are founded in fact on some level, since many
species of salamander, including fire salamanders and Alpine salamanders, excrete toxic,
physiologically active substances. These substances are often excreted when the animal is
threatened, which has the effect of deterring predators. The extent of these properties is
greatly exaggerated though, with a single salamander being regarded as so toxic that by
twining around a tree it could poison the fruit and so kill any who ate them and by falling
into a well could slay all who drank from it. Of all the traits ascribed to salamanders, the
ones relating to fire have stood out most prominently in salamander lore. This connection
probably originates from a behavior common to many species of salamander: hibernating in
and under rotting logs. When wood was brought indoors and put on the fire, the creatures
“mysteriously” appeared from the flames. The 16th-century Italian artist Benvenuto Cellini
(1500–1571) famously recalled witnessing just such an appearance as a child in his
autobiography. According to some writers, the milky substance that a salamander exudes
when frightened and which makes its skin very moist gave rise to the idea that the
salamander could withstand any heat and even put out fires. Early commentators in Europe
often grouped “crawling things” (reptiles or reptilia in Latin) together, and thus creatures in
this group, which typically included salamanders (Latin salamandrae), dragons (Latin
dracones or serpentes), and basilisks (Latin basilisci), were often associated together, as in
Conrad Lycosthenes’ Prodigiorum ac ostentorum chronicon of 1557. The salamander is
mentioned in the Talmud (Hagiga 27a) as a creature that is a product of fire, and anyone
who is smeared with its blood will be immune to harm from fire. Rashi (1040–1105), the
primary commentator on the Talmud, describes the salamander as one which is produced by
burning a fire in the same place for seven years. According to Sahih Bukhari (810–870),
Muhammad said that salamanders are “mischief-doers” and “should be killed”. Leonardo da
Vinci (1452–1519) wrote the following on the salamander: “This has no digestive organs,
and gets no food but from the fire, in which it constantly renews its scaly skin. The
salamander, which renews its scaly skin in the fire, – for virtue.” Later, Paracelsus (1493–
1541) suggested that the salamander was the elemental of fire, which has had substantial
influence on the role of salamanders in the occult. Early travelers to China were shown
garments supposedly woven from salamander hair or wool; the cloth was completely
unharmed by fire. The garments had actually been woven from asbestos. According to T. H.
White, Prester John had a robe made from it; the “Emperor of India” possessed a suit made
from a thousand skins; and Pope Alexander III had a tunic which he valued highly. William
Caxton (1481) wrote: “This Salemandre berithe wulle, of which is made cloth and gyrdles
that may not brenne in the fyre.” Holme (1688) wrote: “. . .I have several times put
[salamander hair] in the Fire and made it red hot and after taken it out, which being cold, yet
remained perfect wool.” An alternative interpretation was that this material was a kind of
silk: A twelfth-century letter supposedly from Prester John says, “Our realm yields the worm
known as the salamander. Salamanders live in fire and make cocoons, which our court ladies
spin and use to weave cloth and garments. To wash and clean these fabrics, they throw them
into flames.” Friar also notes that Marco Polo believed that the “true” salamander was an
incombustible substance found in the earth. In early heraldry, the salamander was depicted
as somewhat like a short-legged dog, surrounded by fire; more recently it is depicted as a
lizard or a natural salamander, but still amidst flames. In the arms of Le Clei shown as
vomissant des flammes (“vomiting flames”) as well. It is often tinctured vert (green) but can
be of any other color or metal. The salamander became a symbol of enduring faith which
triumphs over the fires of passion. It was the badge of Francis I of France, with the motto, “I
 nourish [the good] and extinguish [the bad].” It appears in the arms of Le Havre (below),
Fontainebleau and others. The salamander became the traditional emblem of the smith, and
thus appears in a number of civic arms to symbolize local metal-working industries. It
appears in the arms of Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council (below), as well as the old
County Borough Council. In the crest of the arms of Spennymoor Town Council, the Shafto
family’s salamander also holds a sword to represent the local steel industry.

*Liber 777, Column XXXVIII.

*Watters, op. cit., p. 61.

Fungi:

Above all, Pluto rules the fungi, of which Mark and Dianna McMenamin say:

In a way, the land biota has had to find ways to carry the sea within it and,
moreover, to construct watery conduits from “node” to “node.” And to do so,
this biota has evolved one entirely new kingdom of life whose importance is
only now beginning to be understood: the fungi. Without the web of fungal
hyphae in forest soils (their power is masked by their delicacy), there would be
no redwood trees; there would likely be no trees. The anastomosing (merging)
habits of fungi and their unique enzymatic capabilities enable them to surround
the surfaces of tiny particles of rock, extracting crucial nutrients, and then to
probe or infest the tissues of tree rootlets to deliver the goods – in exchange, of
course, for carbohydrates manufactured by the partner tree.*

In His dominion over the Cherubic Sign of Water, Scorpio, Root of the Power of Water,
represented by the Chalice, surely Pluto rules these tiny, humble, hidden beings because of
whom all of Earth’s terrestrial plant-life, especially those most splendid and wondrous of
things, the great trees of the lands of Earth, are nourished and sustained and, indeed, even
made possible in the first place! It is the fungi who are the original inventors of that
primordial technology, irrigation, by which life is sustained and made to thrive even in the
desert. Indeed, the land-surfaces of Earth are deserts, relative to Her great lakes, seas, and
oceans, and it is only because of the fungi that today’s land ecosystems are possible at all:
without them, most of them could never obtain the water so critically important to life, the
water that comprises the bulk of all forms of Earthly life and serves as the biochemical
coolant for life’s metabolic engine. A fungus is a member of a large group of eukaryotic
organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more
familiar mushrooms. The Fungi are classified as a kingdom that is separate from plants,
animals and bacteria. One major difference between fungi and other kingdoms of organisms
is that fungal cells have cell walls that contain chitin, unlike the cell walls of plants, which
contain cellulose. These and other differences show that the fungi form a single group of
related organisms, named the Eumycota (true fungi or Eumycetes), that share a common
ancestor (a monophyletic group). This fungal group is distinct from the structurally similar
slime molds (myxomycetes) and water molds (oomycetes). The discipline of biology devoted
to the study of fungi is known as mycology, which is often regarded as a branch of botany,
even though genetic studies have shown that fungi are more closely related to animals than
to plants. Abundant worldwide, most fungi are inconspicuous because of the small size of
their structures, and their cryptic lifestyles in soil, on dead matter, and as symbionts of
plants, animals, or other fungi. They may become noticeable when fruiting, either as
mushrooms or molds. Fungi perform an essential role in the decomposition of organic matter
and have fundamental roles in nutrient cycling and exchange. They have long been used as a
direct source of food, such as mushrooms and truffles, as a leavening agent for bread, and in
fermentation of various food products, such as wine, beer, and soy sauce. Since the 1940s,
fungi have been used for the production of antibiotics, and, more recently, various enzymes
produced by fungi are used industrially and in detergents. Fungi are also used as biological
agents to control weeds and pests. Many species produce bioactive compounds called
mycotoxins, such as alkaloids and polyketides, that are toxic to animals including humans.
The fruiting structures of a few species contain psychotropic compounds and are consumed
recreationally or in traditional spiritual ceremonies. Fungi can break down manufactured
materials and buildings, and become significant pathogens of humans and other animals.
Losses of crops due to fungal diseases (e.g. rice blast disease) or food spoilage can have a
large impact on human food supplies and local economies. Kingdom Fungi encompasses an
enormous diversity of taxa with varied ecologies, life cycle strategies, and morphologies
ranging from single-celled aquatic chytrids to large mushrooms. However, little is known of
the true biodiversity of Kingdom Fungi, which has been estimated at around 1.5 million
species, with about 5% of these having been formally classified. Ever since the pioneering
18th and 19th century taxonomical works of Carl Linnaeus, Christian Hendrik Persoon, and
Elias Magnus Fries, fungi have been classified according to their morphology (e.g.,
characteristics such as spore color or microscopic features) or physiology. Advances in
molecular genetics have opened the way for DNA analysis to be incorporated into taxonomy,
which has sometimes challenged the historical groupings based on morphology and other
traits. Phylogenetic studies published in the last decade have helped reshape the
classification of Kingdom Fungi, which is divided into one subkingdom, seven phyla, and
ten subphyla. Many fungi have important symbiotic relationships with organisms from most
if not all Kingdoms. These interactions can be mutualistic or antagonistic in nature, or in
the case of commensal fungi are of no apparent benefit or detriment to the host.
Mycorrhizal symbiosis between plants and fungi is one of the most well-known plant –
fungus associations and is of significant importance for plant growth and persistence in
many ecosystems; over 90% of all plant species engage in mycorrhizal relationships with
fungi and are dependent upon this relationship for survival. The mycorrhizal symbiosis is
ancient, dating to at least 400 million years ago. It often increases the plant’s uptake of
inorganic compounds, such as nitrate and phosphate from soils having low concentrations of
these key plant nutrients. The fungal partners may also mediate plant-to-plant transfer of
carbohydrates and other nutrients. Such mycorrhizal communities are called “common
mycorrhizal networks”. A special case of mycorrhiza is myco-heterotrophy, whereby the
plant parasitizes the fungus, obtaining all of its nutrients from its fungal symbiont. Some
fungal species inhabit the tissues inside roots, stems, and leaves, in which case they are
called endophytes. Similar to mycorrhiza, endophytic colonization by fungi may benefit both
symbionts; for example, endophytes of grasses impart to their host increased resistance to
herbivores and other environmental stresses and receive food and shelter from the plant in
return. Lichens are formed by a symbiotic relationship between algae or cyanobacteria
(referred to in lichen terminology as “photobionts”) and fungi (mostly various species of
ascomycetes and a few basidiomycetes), in which individual photobiont cells are embedded
in a tissue formed by the fungus. Lichens occur in every ecosystem on all continents, play a
key role in soil formation and the initiation of biological succession, and are the dominating
life forms in extreme environments, including polar, alpine, and semiarid desert regions.
They are able to grow on inhospitable surfaces, including bare soil, rocks, tree bark, wood,
shells, barnacles and leaves. As in mycorrhizas, the photobiont provides sugars and other
carbohydrates via photosynthesis, while the fungus provides minerals and water. The
functions of both symbiotic organisms are so closely intertwined that they function almost as
a single organism; in most cases the resulting organism differs greatly from the individual
components. Lichenization is a common mode of nutrition; around 20% of fungi – between
17,500 and 20,000 described species – are lichenized. Characteristics common to most
lichens include obtaining organic carbon by photosynthesis, slow growth, small size, long
life, long-lasting (seasonal) vegetative reproductive structures, mineral nutrition obtained
largely from airborne sources, and greater tolerance of desiccation than most other
photosynthetic organisms in the same habitat. Many insects also engage in mutualistic
relationships with fungi. Several groups of ants cultivate fungi in the order Agaricales as
their primary food source, while ambrosia beetles cultivate various species of fungi in the
bark of trees that they infest. Similarly, females of several wood wasp species (genus Sirex)
inject their eggs together with spores of the wood-rotting fungus Amylostereum areolatum
into the sapwood of pine trees; the growth of the fungus provides ideal nutritional conditions
for the development of the wasp larvae. Termites on the African savannah are also known to
cultivate fungi, and yeasts of the genera Candida and Lachancea inhabit the gut of a wide
range of insects, including neuropterans, beetles, and cockroaches; it is not known whether
these fungi benefit their hosts. Many fungi are parasites on plants, animals (including
humans), and other fungi. Serious pathogens of many cultivated plants causing extensive
damage and losses to agriculture and forestry include the rice blast fungus Magnaporthe
oryzae; tree pathogens such as Ophiostoma ulmi and Ophiostoma novo-ulmi, which cause
Dutch elm disease, and Cryphonectria parasitica, responsible for chestnut blight; and plant
pathogens in the genera Fusarium, Ustilago, Alternaria, and Cochliobolus. Some
carnivorous fungi, such as Paecilomyces lilacinus, are predators on nematodes, which they
capture using an array of specialized structures such as constricting rings or adhesive nets.
Some fungi can cause serious diseases in humans, several of which may be fatal if untreated.
These include aspergilloses, candidoses, coccidioidomycosis, cryptococcosis, histoplasmosis,
mycetomas, and paracoccidioidomycosis. Furthermore, persons with immunodeficiency
conditions are particularly susceptible to disease by genera such as Aspergillus, Candida,
Cryptoccocus, Histoplasma, and Pneumocystis. Other fungi can attack eyes, nails, hair, and
especially skin, the so-called dermatophytic and keratinophilic fungi, and cause local
infections such as ringworm and athlete’s foot. Fungal spores are also a cause of allergies,
and fungi from different taxonomic groups can evoke allergic reactions. Because of
similarities in morphology and lifestyle, the slime molds (myxomycetes) and water molds
(oomycetes) were formerly classified in the kingdom Fungi. Unlike true fungi the cell walls
of these organisms contain cellulose and lack chitin. Slime molds are unikonts like fungi, but
are grouped in the Amoebozoa. Water molds are diploid bikonts, grouped in the
Chromalveolate kingdom. Neither water molds nor slime molds are closely related to the
true fungi, and, therefore, taxonomists no longer group them in the kingdom Fungi.
Nonetheless, studies of the oomycetes and myxomycetes are still often included in mycology
textbooks and primary research literature. The nucleariids, currently grouped in the
Choanozoa, may be a sister group to the eumycete clade, and as such could be included in an
expanded fungal kingdom. In contrast to plants and animals, the early fossil record of the
fungi is meager. Factors that likely contribute to the under-representation of fungal species
among fossils include the nature of fungal fruiting bodies, which are soft, fleshy, and easily
degradable tissues and the microscopic dimensions of most fungal structures, which
therefore are not readily evident. Fungal fossils are difficult to distinguish from those of
other microbes, and are most easily identified when they resemble extant fungi. Often
recovered from a permineralized plant or animal host, these samples are typically studied by
making thin-section preparations that can be examined with light microscopy or
transmission electron microscopy. Compression fossils are studied by dissolving the
surrounding matrix with acid and then using light or scanning electron microscopy to
examine surface details. The earliest fossils possessing features typical of fungi date to the
Proterozoic eon, some 1,430 million years ago (Ma); these multicellular benthic organisms
had filamentous structures with septa, and were capable of anastomosis. More recent studies
(2009) estimate the arrival of fungal organisms at about 760–1060 Ma on the basis of
comparisons of the rate of evolution in closely related groups. For much of the Paleozoic Era
(542–251 Ma), the fungi appear to have been aquatic and consisted of organisms similar to
the extant Chytrids in having flagellum-bearing spores. The evolutionary adaptation from
an aquatic to a terrestrial lifestyle necessitated a diversification of ecological strategies for
obtaining nutrients, including parasitism, saprobism, and the development of mutualistic
relationships such as mycorrhiza and lichenization. Recent (2009) studies suggest that the
ancestral ecological state of the Ascomycota was saprobism, and that independent
lichenization events have occurred multiple times. The fungi probably colonized the land
during the Cambrian (542–488.3 Ma), long before land plants. Fossilized hyphae and spores
recovered from the Ordovician of Wisconsin (460 Ma) resemble modern-day Glomerales,
and existed at a time when the land flora likely consisted of only non-vascular bryophyte-like
plants. Prototaxites, which was probably a fungus or lichen, would have been the tallest
organism of the late Silurian. Fungal fossils do not become common and uncontroversial
until the early Devonian (416–359.2 Ma), when they are abundant in the Rhynie chert,
mostly as Zygomycota and Chytridiomycota. At about this same time, approximately 400
Ma, the Ascomycota and Basidiomycota diverged, and all modern classes of fungi were
 present by the Late Carboniferous (Pennsylvanian, 318.1–299 Ma). Lichen-like fossils have
been found in the Doushantuo Formation in southern China dating back to 635–551 Ma.
Lichens were a component of the early terrestrial ecosystems, and the estimated age of the
oldest terrestrial lichen fossil is 400 Ma; this date corresponds to the age of the oldest
known sporocarp fossil, a Paleopyrenomycites species found in the Rhynie Chert. The oldest
fossil with microscopic features resembling modern-day basidiomycetes is Palaeoancistrus,
found permineralized with a fern from the Pennsylvanian. Rare in the fossil record are the
homobasidiomycetes (a taxon roughly equivalent to the mushroom-producing species of the
agaricomycetes). Two amber-preserved specimens provide evidence that the earliest known
mushroom-forming fungi (the extinct species Archaeomarasmius legletti) appeared during
the mid-Cretaceous, 90 Ma. Some time after the Permian-Triassic extinction event (251.4
Ma), a fungal spike (originally thought to be an extraordinary abundance of fungal spores in
sediments) formed, suggesting that fungi were the dominant life form at this time,
representing nearly 100% of the available fossil record for this period. However, the relative
proportion of fungal spores relative to spores formed by algal species is difficult to assess, the
spike did not appear worldwide, and in many places it did not fall on the Permian-Triassic
boundary. The growth of fungi as hyphae on or in solid substrates or as single cells in
aquatic environments is adapted for the efficient extraction of nutrients, because these
growth forms have high surface area to volume ratios. Hyphae are specifically adapted for
growth on solid surfaces, and to invade substrates and tissues. They can exert large
penetrative mechanical forces; for example, the plant pathogen Magnaporthe grisea forms a
structure called an appressorium which evolved to puncture plant tissues. The pressure
generated by the appressorium, directed against the plant epidermis, can exceed 8
megapascals (1,200 psi). The filamentous fungus Paecilomyces lilacinus uses a similar
structure to penetrate the eggs of nematodes. The mechanical pressure exerted by the
appressorium is generated from physiological processes that increase intracellular turgor by
producing osmolytes such as glycerol. Morphological adaptations such as these are
complemented by hydrolytic enzymes secreted into the environment to digest large organic
molecules – such as polysaccharides, proteins, lipids, and other organic substrates – into
smaller molecules that may then be absorbed as nutrients. The vast majority of filamentous
fungi grow in a polar fashion – i.e., by extension into one direction – by elongation at the tip
(apex) of the hyphae. Alternative forms of fungal growth include intercalary extension (i.e.,
by longitudinal expansion of hyphal compartments that are below the apex) as in the case of
some endophytic fungi, or growth by volume expansion during the development of
mushroom stipes and other large organs. Growth of fungi as multicellular structures
consisting of somatic and reproductive cells – a feature independently evolved in animals
and plants – has several functions, including the development of fruiting bodies for
dissemination of sexual spores (see above) and biofilms for substrate colonization and
intercellular communication. Traditionally, the fungi are considered heterotrophs,
organisms that rely solely on carbon fixed by other organisms for metabolism. Fungi have
evolved a high degree of metabolic versatility that allows them to use a diverse range of
organic substrates for growth, including simple compounds such as nitrate, ammonia,
acetate, or ethanol. For some species it has been shown that the pigment melanin may play a
role in extracting energy from ionizing radiation, such as gamma radiation; however, this
form of “radiotrophic” growth has only been described for a few species, the effects on
growth rates are small, and the underlying biophysical and biochemical processes are not
known. The authors speculate that this process might bear similarity to CO2 fixation via
visible light, but instead utilizing ionizing radiation as a source of energy.

*Mark and Dianna McMenamin, Hypersea: Life on Land (New York: Columbia University Press,
1994), p. 5.

Creatures in general:

Parasites, medicinal plants, dwarfed plants and trees (e.g., bonsais)

 Mutant forms and sports which are the result of mutagenic materials or electromagnetic
energy impact the reproductive tissue of the parent organisms
Watters gives the microscopic agents that cause venereal pathogens, such as Treponema
pallidum, the bacterium that causes syphilis, or AIDS, caused by a virus. *
To this list could be added all animals which live underground, particularly those which
till up the soil and aerate it, as earthworms, snakes, and moles do; or which revitalize it,
such as molds and fungi which break down organic matter and thereby make the nutrients in
it available to living plants.
Anaerobic soil bacteria are Plutonian, since these prokaryotes live their entire lives
underground. So also are those anaerobic commensal bacteria that inhabit the large bowel of
vertebrates, and their cousins that thrive in sewers, since these lightless, airless spaces are
ruled by Pluto, by definition.

*Watters, op. cit., p. 61.

Vegetable drugs (plant extracts):

Extractions used for purging the body; cascara; tobacco

Clothing, Magickal Weapons, and other things, objects, and processes:

Liber 777 gives the following associations for Pluto:

Magickal Powers:*

Key 31: Evocation, Pyromancy

Key 31-bis: Invisibility, Transformation, Vision of the Genius

Magickal Weapons:**

Key 31: The Wand or Lamp, Pyramid of Fire

Key 31-bis: None is given

De Vore gives synthetics created by a process of splitting and recondensing, plastic, and
nuclear fission; idealistic organizations that attack social evils, social organizations that
exist to combat an elitist clique or privileged class, and ideas that are ahead of their time and
can’t bear fruit until re-advocated in the future; organized labor; chain-store syndicates
[franchises?]; group activities; and mob psychology.†
Pluto primarily rules raw power, death and transformation, and everything as sociated
with these. Corollary functions include metamorphosis, re-birth and regeneration. So such
phenomena, processes, and conditions as the following may be considered to be ruled by
Pluto: violence in any form; complications; unearthing, exhumation; profundity; garbage,
refuse, toxic waste, especially nuclear waste; Alchemy, in particular, Alchemical
decomposition and putrefaction of substances; recycling, transformation, transmutation;
crime and the criminal underworld; politics and the exercise of political power; recycling;
germination; seeds, sperm, ova, eggs; venereal disease; rape and rapists; extremes of any -
thing; terrorism and terrorists; group-will and the power of a group; mining and miners,
buried treasures; psychoanalysis, psychology; healers; death and everything associated with
it; nuclear and thermonuclear energy and devices; dictatorships; destruction, cataclysms.
Because Pluto is the Lord of Primordial Fire, He thus rules all flammable substances and
materials. For the same reason, He rules all things that give off steady high heat on a long-
term basis, such as a nuclear reactor and the fuels that power it, or the cores of Stars. And
he rules all technological advances which have made such arcane things possible on an
artificial basis. Thus any high-tech power-weapon, properly consecrated, would make a
 dandy Plutonian Magickal weapon. Such would include any sort of gun, rocket, cannon,
howitzer, explosive mine, torpedo, inertially guided rocket-propelled missile, bomber-plane,
fighter-plane, or nuclear device.
Pluto rules Kundalini energy, which is used by Magickians to bring about
transformation or transmutation of environmental conditions in conformity with their Wills.
Kundalini energy, drawn up the spinal chakras to the brain via meditation and mystical
techniques, also produces Enlightenment and self-transformation; it is the essential energy
of conception, the bringing of a spirit into physical incarnation in some form or other. All
these are expressions of metamorphosis and transformation, just as death is. Thus sex,
Magick, Enlightenment, and sexual (meiotic) reproduction are all Plutonian phenomena.
Pluto also rules chi, the basic metabolic energy of the body, since this is an other form of
raw, universal energy, underlying all biological being. Pathologies in the flow of chi in the
body give rise to physical ailments; it is by adjusting chi-flow by means of various
techniques that acupuncturists bring about healing. Out of chi come Yin (cold, wet) and
Yang (hot, dry), various combinations of which form the Elements out of which all things
are made; ultimately, all things degrade back into their Elemental forms, which break down
into Yin and Yang, which recombine to produce chi. It is chi which, in concert with various
manifestations of Kundalini energy, is involved in such things as poltergeist at tacks,
psychogenic medical phenomena such as stigmata, psychokinetic action such as teleportation
or levitation, and the successful accomplishment of Magickal Workings. Therefore chi is
governed by Pluto.
Given the preceding discussion, clothing ruled by Pluto includes, e.g., shrouds;
seductive and enticing outfits, such as those sold by Frederick’s of Hollywood, and the
costumes worn by prostitutes and porno film stars; miners’ clothing; clothing worn in line
of duty by coroners, forensic pathologists, morticians, any anyone else who deals directly
with corpses; outfits worn by anyone working in high-temperature environments of any
kind, such as firemen; clothing worn by smiths while at work; and the heavy protective
clothing and gear worn by those who work with or service radioactive materials or
equipment.
Tools and gear ruled by Pluto include the spades, picks, and shovels used to dig graves;
crematorium equipment; matches, lighters, flammable fluids, charcoal briquettes, and other
fire-starting materials; sex-toys; mining equipment; the instruments used for performing
autopsies or pathology examinations; Pulaskis, hoses, and other fire-fighting gear; and
hammer, anvil, bellows, furnace, and other tools of the smithy; and the waldos used for
manipulating radioactive materials in relative safety.

*Liber 777, Column XLV.

**Ibid., Column XLI.

†De Vore, op. cit., pp. 286-303.

Things/commodities/products:

Goth clothing and jewelry

Anatomy and physiology:

Liber 777 gives the “organs of circulation” for Key 31, and the “organs of intelligence”
(i.e., the central nervous system; see remarks under correspondences for foods, above) for
Key 31-bis.
De Vore gives the pancreas, the digestive glands, digestive and other enzymes, and the
balance between anabolism and catabolism in metabolic functioning. 216
 Pluto rules the organs of reproduction and sexuality; the brain, particularly the limbic
brain (mid-brain, the mammalian paleocortex) and the brain stem (the “reptile brain,” the
archeocortex), because of their involvement in sexuality, politics, and Tantric Magick; the
colon (lower bowel); and the parts of the brain which release chemicals causing shut-down
of the body, resulting in death, according to a genetically-regulated biophysiological
schedule.
In organisms which are in the process of undergoing metamorphosis from one life-stage
to another, e.g., butterflies in the pupal (cocoon) stage, Pluto rules the templates upon which
the new form of the organism is reconstructed out of the dissolved remains of the old one.
He also rules ova (eggs), sperm, seeds, and spores.
Pluto rules all the most fundamental, instinctive aspects of biology, including death, the
drive for power, and metamorphosis of any kind. Therefore since the biology of sex is
among the most primordial, basic aspects of eukaryote existence, including ours, He rules
sexuality, as a phenomenon, a primordial drive, and a psychological set. Whereas Venus
rules personal attraction between individuals, and Mars rules the self-assertive behavior
necessary to achieve sexual satisfaction, Pluto rules the overwhelming need for sex behind
the behaviors ruled by Venus and Mars, a need that can ultimately transcend even the drive
for self-preservation. Essentially, Pluto rules communion and the great driving hunger to
participate in it, on every level: genetic, fleshly, psychological, psychic, spiritual. The body
dies so that, by recycling its component chemicals, the vitality of the living Earth may be
restored, and room made for biological change, renewal, and creativity. In sex, the mind
dies in the mind of another, so that the soul and spirit may be renewed. In reproduction,
ovum and sperm die in each other so that new life may be thereby created. All these are
profoundly Plutonian functions, individual aspects of the three-in-one processes governed by
Pluto: death-decay-rebirth. All of them require the submergence and temporary obliteration
of the self, whether biochemical, genetic, psychological, or psychospiritual, in a greater self
– ecological, cytological, or psychospiritual – in order that it may be thereby revitalized and
restored to and reintegrated into the living universe. Sexual union is the most archetypal
form of all of these, and the one most clearly associated with Pluto, in both its benign and
life-sustaining forms, such as mutual orgasm, and its malefic ones, such as sexual child-
abuse, libidinally motivated violence against others, rape, and sex-killings.

Psychology:

De Vore gives for Pluto those states of mind or tendencies of character which are
expressions in individuals of the group-mind of a whole society or ecosystem. He says that
“[Pluto] affords incentive to great literary or dramatic geniuses who inculcate in their works
Plutonian doctrines calculated to bear fruit through the succeeding generation.” He adds
that the Plutonian temperament has a total disregard for constituted authority or vested
rights, except as administered for the common welfare of all. He says that even at his worst,
the Plutonian individual “is more likely to be activated by a sense of righteous indignation on
behalf of society than by personal vindictiveness.” 215
The psychological states governed by Pluto include orgasm; those states achieved by
means of Tantric techniques; the psychophysical states experienced by those recovering
from extensive 3rd- and 4th-degree burns; the state of mind at the moment of death; sexual
arousal; the psychology of pregnancy; the experience of giving birth; the experience of the
“great white light” in the Samadhi-like state which can sometimes be induced by large doses
of LSD. Plutonian faculties and abilities include political ability; the talents involved in
careers such as forensic pathology; those predisposing one to become an able fire-fighter;
skill at arousing others sexually and satisfying them; the set of traits and the psychospiritual
makeup that enables one to become an efficient accumulator and manager of great power
and enormous wealth, i.e., a smith, an alchemist, a shaman,* a politician or a plutocrat.

*While it is Chiron, the subject of Part 14, Chapter 1 of Book 2 of Volume 2 of New Magicks for a New
Age, Who brings the horrifying, undeserved evils that create the wounding necessary to creation of
 the shaman, it is Pluto Who enables the those who sustain such wounds to transcend those wounds,
transmuting themselves into shamans, beings of true psychospiritual and technological power, rather
than remaining helpless victims of their tragedies.

Diseases:

Liber 777 gives death, for Key 1; fever, for Key 31; and death/”full insanity” for Key
31-bis.
De Vore gives “ailments resulting from deposits of precipitated mineral products in
consequence of chronic acidosis,” such as, e.g., kidney stones, arthritis, and
arteriosclerosis.217
I would add diseases of the colon, in particular constipation, diverticulosis, and bowel
cancer; gangrene; peritonitis; septicemia (blood-poisoning); pyromania and pyrophobia;
radiation sickness; cancers in general, as well as anything else that is the result of chronic
tissue toxicity; heavy-metal poisoning; any dysfunction of the organs of elimination; AIDS
or any other collapse of immune function, due to whatever cause, including the sorts of
chronic depressions and related condition that are the psychospiritual equivalent of these,
i.e., loss of ability to resist assaults from or invasions by external pathogens of body, psyche,
or spirit; diseases due to internal parasites and anaerobic organisms; agoraphobia, in which
the sufferer is terrified of open spaces, and therefore stays hidden within his or her dwelling;
all morbid conditions, whether of body or mind, e.g., gangrene, suicidal depression, suicidal
conditions in general; neurotic anxiety about death and dying; paranoid schizophrenia (a
particularly malignant manifestation of deficient psychospiritual immune function);
coprophilia; sexual dysfunctions; sexual obsessions, especially those involving necrophilia;
obsessions about power, particular social and sexual power, and manipulative behaviors
designed to acquire and maintain it over family members and associates;* and obsessions of
any kind, as a general case.

*Though since this pathology is passive-aggressive in nature, Pluto is only a secondary ruler of it, its
primary ruler being Neptune.

Magickal image: The angel Israfel or Gabriel blowing the Last Trump, and the dead rising from
their tombs.

Domain: The Fiery realms in general, and, in particular, the deep crust, mantle, and core of the
Earth and Outer Space

Archangel: Gabriel

Quarter: Western

Buddhist symbolism:

Occupations, businesses, employment, and ecological niches:

Watters gives political undergrounds, organized crime, secret police, espionage agents,
and plotters, all of which are involved in activities that must be kept concealed. Likewise
she gives anarchy and anarchists, the FBI. and CIA., tyrants, dictators, rapists, usurers,
extortionists, terrorists, and those who rule by threat or terror, inquisitions, and inquisitors. 218
In general, professions and occupations ruled by Pluto include miners and any others
who make their living working underground; spelunkers/troglodytes, that is, those who
explore caves either for recreation or for purposes of scientific research; veterinarians who
 specialize in treating Plutonian animals, and those who do research on them, such as
herpetologists and herpetological veterinarians; physicians who treat Plutonian diseases;
coroners and morticians; forensic pathologists, who study the bodies of the dead to
determine how they died and/or their identity; volcanologists; nuclear physicists and
engineers, particularly the latter; goldsmiths and any other smiths, because their patron God
is Vulcan, Lord of the Forge, an avatar of Pluto; firemen; psychology and psychologists,
particularly depth psychoanalysts; those who do ground-breaking research in any field;
those who make a living hunting for and recovering buried treasure, and all those en gaged in
salvage work of any kind; recycling centers and those who staff them; ecologists who study
soils, the ecology of fire, and the recycling of nutrients in the biosphere; detectives of all
kinds; torturers, insofar as it is their purpose to extract information from their subjects;*
journalists who specialize in exposés; grave-robbers, commonly referred to as “resurrection
artists” in Victorian England and since; politicians of all kinds, particularly chief
executives, tyrants, and dictators; Tantric (Sex-) Magickians; prostitutes, pornographers,
strip-tease artists, and anyone else whose job it is to tease, tantalize, and arouse sexually, in -
cluding all those who make and sell sexually enticing garments or sex-toys; nu clear and
thermonuclear physicists, technicians, and anyone else working with nuclear or
thermonuclear energy in any way or form, for any purpose; physicians who treat
dysfunctions involving infertility; ecologists who specialize in the study of the recycling of
materials through natural processes; those who work in the recycling industry, in any
capacity; sanitation engineers (i.e., those employed in garbage pick-up, sewer work, etc.);
physicians who treat sexual dysfunctions; those involved with re-establishing the fertility of
worn-out soils; physicians who treat dysfunctions of the lower bowel, immune-system
disorders (e.g., AIDS), venereal diseases, radiation sickness, cancers, the sex-organs, the
central nervous system, especially the limbic brain and brain-stem, and the prostate gland;
those who work in poison-treatment centers; butchers; executioners; Sonderkommandos
(death-camp guards, particularly those who are involved in torture or mas sacres of
prisoners); and those whose work involves any aspects of aggravated abuses, sexual and
otherwise, of children or other helpless dependents, or political torture. (Notice how many
of these overlap with Neptune’s rulerships, as well as those of Saturn.)
Neptune is the King’s Poet, the Royal Bard; Pluto is the King. Uranus is the Re-
volutionary, Neptune the Martyr, and Pluto the Aristocracy.
Those who are Goths and embrace that way of life are ruled by Pluto.

*However, the cruelty of their operations, and the sort of temperament that selects such a line of work, is
ruled by Neptune.

Places, nations, and peoples:

Pluto rules the Eastern Quarter, and all fiery places, such as hearths, furnaces, forges,
the Alchemical Furnace, foundries, nuclear reactors, Tokimak fusion generators, the Earth’s
molten core, the cores of Stars, etc. Any place connected with the dead or the things of the
dead, including mortuaries, coroners’ offices, graveyards, etc., are Plutonian.
Volcanoes are ruled by Pluto. Mines and caves are the abode of Pluto; so are all places
consecrated to Magick, particularly Tantric Magick, concerned with Workings whose
purpose is to make known that which is at present unknown. Detectives’ offices are
Plutonian, as are places of research, surgeries, pathology laboratories, torture-chambers,
offices of the inquisitor, etc. Hot deserts are Plutonian, partly because of their heat, partly
because of the Scorpionic nature of their territory and inhabitants.* Artesian wells are
Plutonian (see remarks above, on the animals and other non-human organisms ruled by
Pluto).
Pluto rules the interior of the Earth, as well as that of any other Planet with a molten,
hot core, as He does the interiors of most Stars, Whose heat and light are generated by
 thermonuclear fusion deep in Their hearts (since these reactions are thermonuclear in
nature, and because they take place hidden away from all else deep within these Stars, yet
producing something – heat and light – that makes its way to the surfaces of the Stars and
the universe as a whole). Pluto rules all that is truly alien, hence black holes, since we have
no idea what their interiors may be like. All places of power in any form are Plutonian. So
are delivery-rooms and birthing-rooms, death-beds, houses of prostitution, X-rated theaters
and those in which eroteurs and eroteuses regularly perform for the enjoyment of paying
audiences, banks and bank-vaults, treasury buildings, sunken ships which harbor great
treasures and buried treasure-chests, sewers, abattoirs, shambles (places of butchering),
death-camps, crematoria, outdoor latrines, recycling centers, monetary mints (since these
generate specie in huge quantities, a source of real power).
Places on the Inner Planes associated with Pluto are Tartaros of Greek mythology;
R’lyeh, the palace of Cthulhu located on the ocean floor, described in H. P. Lovecraft’s
Cthulhu Mythos; the Tunnels of Set, as described by Qaballists such as Kenneth Grant; the
Inferno and Purgatorio of Dante’s Divine Comedy; Gehenna, a hell of torment, named after
the Valley of Hinnom, near Jerusalem, where refuse was burned in Biblical times; and
Sheol, the abode of the dead, which, according to Judaic tradition, is located in the depths of
the Earth, more or less equivalent to Tartaros. Modern mythological examples of Plutonian
places include the haunts inhabited by Chas. Addams’ Addams family and the rest of his
ghoulish crew, Gahan Wilson’s creations, The Deadly Desert of Oz, etc. Since in Polynesian
mythology Hell is supposed to be located in the great abyssal deeps of the Pacific Ocean, the
depths of the open sea could be considered to be associated with Pluto in that mythological
framework, though normally these are associated with Neptune and His realm.

*Cold deserts are ruled by Saturn.

Nations:

Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia are good examples of Plutonian nation-states.
Both were relatively (and fortunately) short-lived examples of nations in which absolute
power – Magickal, political, and military – was used to keep a huge number of people
subjugated and controlled by a very small power-elite. The Plutonian seductiveness of
the Magickal aspects of such political control were especially evident in Nazi Germany.
The United States of America, though ruled principally by Mercury, because of the
Gemini Ascendant of its natus (July 4, 1776 e.v., 2:15 a.m., local time, Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania), also has Mars rising, which is manifest, among other places, in its
Scorpio-ruled capital city, Washington, D.C.; so that nation is co-ruled by Scorpio, and
thus by Pluto.

Cities:

All great cities which, like the Phoenix, have been consumed by fire and then have
risen again, reborn, from their own ashes into a far greater prominence than they ever
had before are Pluto’s wards. Such cities include Moscow (burned in 1812 by its own
inhabitants, to frustrate the advance of Napoleon Bonaparte); London (1666, the Great
Fire of London); Chicago (October 8, 1871); San Francisco (April 1906); Seattle,
Washington (1889); Nagasaki, Japan (1945); Hiroshima, Japan; Tokyo, Japan (18th
Century); Beijing, China (1905, during the Boxer Rebellion); Berlin, Germany (1944-
5). Pompeii, Italy is ruled by Pluto because, once suddenly, completely buried by
volcanic ash from the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 e.v., it was unearthed and made
accessible to study by modern cultures in the late 19th Century e.v. Seattle,
Washington, already cited as an example of a great city that was burned down and arose
again from its ashes, is ruled by Scorpio, because of its location in swamplands and
tidelands; Washington, D.C. is another example of a highly Scorpionic city, both
because of its original location in swamplands and the Plutonian nature of the political
scene there.
 Peoples:

The world population of people who are the descendants of viable mutations due to
radiation, pollution, and other Plutonian phenomena are under Pluto’s rule.
The “sewer people” – populations of human beings which have been living and
even thriving in the sewers, steam-tunnels, subway systems, and other underground
habitats provided by modern cities in numerous countries around the world.
Anthropologists have made several studies of those living under American cities. Many
such colonies apparently began during the Great Depression of the 1920s, when many
destitute families turned in desperation to the sewers to live, because these were
constantly warm and sheltered, relatively safe environments. Some five or more
generations of them now live down in our cities’ sewers, in some cases. Their ranks
have been swelled in recent years by the homeless as well as people who were turned out
onto the streets when mental hospitals closed their doors as part of attempts by the states
to curb spending. No one knows what the actual sizes of these populations are, and any
attempt to measure them would probably be in vain, as the people in these underground
colonies are reportedly extremely shy and reclusive as far as exposure to those dwelling
aboveground go. They probably have extremely hardy and resilient immune systems,
given their constant exposure to extremely septic environments, which guarantees that
anyone who does not have extremely high immunity to any and all microorganisms will
soon die down there due to septicemia or any one of thousands of viral or other
infectious ailments.
Those who have embraced Goth styles and a Goth mindset are ruled by Pluto.

Matters of the horoscope:

Watters gives seeds, sperm and ova; the hidden wealth in mines; any phase of a
growth cycle which is hidden from view, such as a chrysalis or pupal stage; corpses; buried
treasure; excrement; the process of decomposition, its agents and by-products; all secret
agreements; all underground organizations; detectives; rape and rapists; tyrants and
dictators; enormous wealth and plutocrats; usury and extortion; and broad genetic
variation of the various peoples of the Earth, sometimes called “race.” 219
Matters of the horoscope signified by Pluto also include abductions and kidnapping;
abortions (surgical); abscesses; abuse (e.g., child-abuse, spouse-abuse): AIDS, gonorrhea,
herpes, leprosy, syphilis, venereal diseases, yaws; Alchemy,* ambushes, assassinations,**
and murder; amputation, annihilation, death, and dying; analysis, analysts, depth
psychology, psychoanalysis, psychology;† anonymous letters;** apocalypse, the
Apocalypse, apocalyptic matters; archeology; artifacts; nuclear and ther monuclear wea-
pons; nuclear and thermonuclear energy, physics, and engineering; betrayal;** brutality;
buried treasure; butchery, carnage, shambles; carrion, decay, decaying matter; the CIA,
DEA, FBI, KGB, and all other secret police organizations; cleaning out, clearing away;
coercion, compelling force, compulsion, compulsive sex, compulsory cooperation,
compulsions (psychological); conception; constipation; cremation; crime, particularly
organized crime, and criminal actions; cruelty; danger; death, mortality; debt, debts;
destiny, fate (Pluto is the diurnal esoteric ruler of Capricorn and the Tenth House, which rule
these); destruction; detection, investigation; digging up, exhumation, unearthing; domi-
nance, domination; drastic events; dumps, garbage cans, garbage disposals, junk,††
junkyards,†† recycling, recycling bins, recycling centers, refuse, rubbish (with Saturn and
Neptune); ejaculation, orgasm, sex, sex organs, sexual disease, sexual charisma, sexual
energy, sexuality, sexual merging, sexual potency, sexual power, sexual release; ejection;
elimination; extremes; Fire, the Element; fire, the physical phenomenon; firearms, guns,
explosive weapons of any kind (because of the sheer, raw power they confer on the user);
force, moral and spiritual as well as physical; force majeur, forcible control of people;
funerals; gangs; ghouls; groups of people, as sources of power; healing, healing power
(Pluto is diurnally exalted in Virgo and the Sixth House, which rule healing and healers);
hidden things (that later are revealed tot he world); hot tubs;* incest;** interiors;
 intensity; insects; chi energy; Kundalini energy; Magick, Ceremonial; man ipulation
(psychological), manipulativeness; mass action; mass production; masses of people, the
Masses; metamorphosis, transformation, transmutation; money and other resources of other
people; mortgages; new beginnings, rebirth, rejuvenation, renewal, renewed or restored
things, renovation; obsessions; occult matters;‡ paranoia,†† suspicion; pathology;
penetration; pensions; plagues;‡‡ plasma physics;# plots;$$ plumbing; # poisons, toxins;**
pollution, toxic wastes, waste; pornography, prostitution, strip-tease; power, in a generic
sense; probes, probing; psychology;+ purges; rants (SubGenius preachings); rape;
research; plots; saboteurs; salvage; Samadhi; scandal, particularly hidden scandal; ## se-
crets;‡ septic tanks; sewers; @ sex-Magick, Tantra; shrewdness; snakes; social changes;
society, as a colonial organism or collective entity; spies; $$ the spirit, the Will, True Will;
spiritual rebirth; surgery; taxes; terrorists; the unconscious mind; $$ undercover agents; $$
upheavals;@@ vermin; violence; viruses; and X-rays. 220

*Also ruled by Neptune, since Neptune is Lord of Water, and so much of the processing carried out in
Alchemy involves extensive use of water.

**Pluto is actually only a secondary Lord of ambushes, assassinations, and other strikes from concealment
and covert crimes, the primary Lord of which is Neptune, ruler of Hidden Things.

†These are primarily ruled by Mercury.

†Also ruled by Saturn and Neptune.

‡Also ruled by Neptune, Lord of Hidden Things.

‡‡Also ruled by Neptune, Luna, and Mercury.

#
Also ruled by Neptune, Lord of Fluids and Liquids.
##
The primary ruler is Neptune, as long as the phenomenon and hidden; the primary ruler is Pluto, once it
emerges from hiding.
@
Particularly the alligators that inhabit them in NYC, heh-heh-heh – not to men tion New York White, an
albino version of a certain popular Herb That Dare Not Speak Its Name, which old-time beatniks and
hippies will swear on a stack of High Times Magazine grows wild down there in vast profusion, so
potent that just one little hit of the stuff can permanently relieve even, yea, death and taxes (but not
shaving!).
@@
With Uranus.

Music:

Igor Stravinsky, The Firebird; heavy-metal music; the “Horst Wessel” lied, the official
song of the Nazi Party of Germany; The “Internationale” of the International Communist
Party; The Firm, “Radioactive” (included in the album The Firm, 1985); Oingo Boingo,
Dead Man’s Party (album, 1985)

Paintings:

Illustrations of Hell from the French 15th-Century Hours of Catherine of Cleves

Jan van Eyck’s Last Judgment, c. 1440
Pieter Brueghel the Elder, The Harrowing of Hell
Hieronymus Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights and The Hay-Wain
 Jan Brueghel, Orpheus
Peter Paul Rubens, The Damned
John Martin, The Fallen Angels Entering Pandemonium (1840)
Salvador Dali, Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate One
Second Before Awakening (1944), The Metamorphosis of Narcissus (1937), The Atavism of
Dusk (1933-4), The Endless Enigma (1938), Apparition of Face and Fruit Dish on a Beach
(1938), The Invisible Man (1929-1933), Spain (1938), etc.
Gustav Doré’s illustrations for Dante’s Inferno (begun 1857)
Michael Whelan’s cover illustrations for the 1982 Ballantine Books reprints of the
works of H. P. Lovecraft

Cartoons, cartoonists:

The works of Chas. Addams, “Ghastly” Graham Ingels of EC comix fame, Gahan
Wilson
The early Don Martin; his cartoons in 1950s issues of MAD Magazine often had a
darkly sexual or even murderous tone that was very disturbing.

Television:

The Addams Family (series)

Cinema:

Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula

Tim Burton’s Batman (1992) and Batman Returns (1993)
Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins (2005) and The Dark Knight (2008)
Rob Reiner’s Misery
Brian Grazer’s Backdraft
George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968), Dawn of the Dead (1979), Day of
the Dead (1985), and Land of the Dead (2005)
David Cronenberg’s They Came From Within (1975)
Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), The Corpse Bride (2005), and
Alice in Wonderland (2010)
Scott Rudin’s The Addams Family (1992) and Addams Family Values (1993)
Young and Faiman’s Ferngully: The Last Rainforest (1992)
Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List (1993)
The series Nightmare on Elm Street, starring Robert Englund as Freddy Krueger

Theater:

Johann Wolfgang von Geothe’s Faust; Christopher Marlowe’s Faust; George Gordon,
Lord Byron’s Manfred and Cain

Sculpture:

Auguste Rodin, The Gates of Hell

Poetry:

Dante Alighieri’s Inferno; John Milton’s Paradise Lost; Christina Rossetti’s Goblin
Market (1862); H. P. Lovecraft’s collected poems, Fungi from Yuggoth

Books and other literary productions:

These include the literature of horror (which is co-ruled by Neptune and Saturn),
especially works by such modern masters of human sociopsychology, sociopathology, and
spiritual pathology as H. P. Lovecraft, Stephen King, and R. R. McCammon – and, of
course, those all-time fave horror raves, Bill Gaines’ and Al Feldstein’s EC line of horror
comix of the 1950s (heh-heh-heh, to quote the Old Witch and the Crypt-Keeper . . .). Henry
James’ classic The Turn of the Screw is exemplary; so is Oscar Wilde’s The Portrait of
Dorian Gray. Other good examples of Plutonian horror literature include, e.g.: Bram
Stoker, Dracula (1897); John Skipp and Craig Spector (editors), Book of the Dead (New
York: Bantam, 1989) and Still Dead: Book of the Dead 2 (New York: Bantam Books,
1992); Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus (1818);
Robert R. McCammon (editor), Under the Fang (New York: Pocket Books, 1991); Robert
R. McCammon, Swan Song (New York: Pocket Books, 1987); Jack Williamson, Darker
Than You Think (Street and Smith Publications, for Unknown, 1940); Kim Newman, Anno
Dracula(New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1993); Michele Slung (editor), I Shudder at
Your Touch: 22 Tales of Sex and Horror (New York: Roc Books, 1991) and Shudder
Again: 22 Tales of Sex and Horror (New York: Roc Books, 1993); Robert A. Heinlein,
The Puppet Masters (New York: Del Rey Books, 1990); Jeff Gelb and Lonn Friend
(editors), Hot Blood: Tales of Erotic Horror (New York: Pocket Books, 1989); Jeff Gelb
and Michael Garrett (editors), Hotter Blood: More Tales of Erotic Horror (New York:
Pocket Books, 1991) and Hottest Blood (New York: Pocket Books, 1993); Kathe Koja, Skin
(New York: Delacorte Press, 1993); Stephen King, It (New York: Viking Penguin, Inc.,
1986), The Dark Half (New York: Viking Penguin, Inc., 1989), Dolores Claiborne (New
York: Viking Penguin, Inc., 1993), Gerald’s Game (New York: Viking Penguin, Inc.,
1992, The Stand (New York: Doubleday, 1990); Cordwainer Smith (the nom de plume of
Paul Linebarger), “A Planet Named Shayol” (first appeared in Galaxy, October 1963); C. L.
Moore’s “Black God’s Kiss” (1934), “Black God’s Shadow” (1934), “Black Thirst” (1934),
and “Shambleau” (1933); Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, Inferno (New York: Pocket
Books, 1976); Janet Morris (editor), Heroes in Hell (New York: Baen Books, 1986)
Already listed here are collections of erotic horror fiction, ruled by Pluto both because of
their inclusion in the genre of horror and because of their erotic content. In this context, of
course, must be included the works of Le Comte Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, The
Hundred and Twenty Days at Sodom (179-?), Philosophy in the Boudoire (179-?), Justine,
or The Misfortunes of Virtue (1791), and Juliette, the Prosperities of Vice (1791). Pauline
Reagé’s The Story of O (Great Britain: The Olympia Press, 1970) is clearly Plutonian in
nature. So is the trilogy by A. N. Roquelaure (the nom de plume of Anne Rice), The
Claiming of Sleeping Beauty (New York: Plume, 1983), Beauty’s Punishment (New York:
Plume, 1984), and Beauty’s Release (New York: Plume, 1985). The anonymously written,
supposed Victorian novel A Man With a Maid, published by Grove Press, like The Story of O
manifests a sexually frenzied, ecstatic exultation in absolute power wielded by men over their
female sexual objects, and thus deals with Plutonian themes on several planes
simultaneously.
George Orwell’s political horror novel 1984 is perhaps the most famous of all Plutonian
literary works. This one novel alone by itself is a perfect illustration of the dark side of
Pluto.
Novels dealing with fires and fire-fighting are also Plutonian. George O. Smith’s
ecological novel Fire (New York: Random House, 1948) is a good example of such novels.
Novels dealing with and exposing gross social evils and horrors include such works as
The Sacrifice (1991) and Down in the Zero (1994) by Andrew Vachss, crusading attorney
and author who has devoted his life to protecting children.
Apocalypse Culture, edited by Adam Parfrey (New York: Amok Press, 1987) is an
anthology of essays and articles of horrifying and apocalyptic nature, clearly Plutonian in
nature.
Thomas Keneally’s Schindler’s List (New York: Touchstone Books, 1982), is Plutonian
because of its treatment of the salvation of a remnant within apocalyptic mass-death by a
hypersexual miracle-worker who, as a mortal avatar of the Psychopompos, lead an incredible
number back into life from the land of the dead.
Niccolo Machievelli’s The Prince is a classic Plutonian study, inasmuch as it deals with
political power, its acquisition, and its retention.
Geoffrey Masson’s Assault on Truth: Freud’s Suppression of the Seduction Theory
(New York: Farrar-Straus-Giroux, 1984) is archetypally Plutonian. It is an exposé, and
ruled by Pluto for that reason. It deals with power and sex, Plutonian subjects par
 excellence. And it is an exposé‚ of Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, the latter
also ruled by Pluto – Pluto piled on top of Pluto!
Other non-fiction works dealing with Plutonian issues and themes include, e.g., Linda
A. Fairstein, Sexual Violence: Our War Against Rape (New York: William Morrow and
Co., Inc., 1993); Dave Foreman and Bill Haywood, Ecodefense: A Field Guide to
Monkeywrenching, Second Edition (Tucson, AZ: Ned Ludd Books, 1987); Harold Thomas,
editor, The World Power Foundation: Its Goals and Platform (Port Townsend, WA:
Loompanics Unlimited, 1980); Philippe Aries, The Hour of Our Death (New York: Vintage
Books, 1982); Paul Mones, When A Child Kills: Abused Children Who Kill Their Parents
(New York: Pocket Books, 1991); Robert S. Mendelsohn, M.D., Confessions of a Medical
Heretic (New York: Warner Books, 1979); Michio Kaku, Hyperspace: A Scientific Od-
yssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension (New York:
Oxford University Press, 1994); Kip S. Thorne, Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein’s
Outrageous Legacy (New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 1994); and Tony Hey and Patrick
Waters, The Quantum Universe (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
Twilight, a series of four vampire-based fantasy romance novels by American author
Stephenie Meyer, charting a period in the life of Isabella “Bella” Swan, a teenage girl who
moves to Forks, Washington, and falls in love with a 104-year-old vampire named Edward
Cullen, is Plutonian.
Of course the Book of Revelation of the New Testament, as a classic example of
apocalyptic literature, is Plutonian in nature. In fact, Pluto’s Tarot Trump, Trump XX, The
Last Judgment/The Aeon, has its current form because of its use as a pedagogical tool by
such sects as the Albigensians to teach that book of the Bible to those who could not read.
This list could be extended indefinitely. As it stands, however, it gives enough clear
examples of Plutonian literature to illustrate what sorts of works qualify as members of
Pluto’s domain.

Saints and exemplars:

Admiral Hyman G. Rickover, U.S.N., Ret. (1900-1986), Father of the Nuclear

Submarine; Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (1931-), General Secretary of the Communist
Party of the Soviet Union (1895-1991) and architect of the end of Communist government in
Russia and the other erstwhile Soviet Socialist Republics; Boris Yeltsin (1931-), President of
Russia (1990-), who helped bring about the end of the old Soviet Union and engineer its
replacement by a new commonwealth of Easter-block states; Anton Szandor LaVey (1930-),
founder and high priest of the First Church of Satan) and initiator of a branch of Magick
which, as an esoteric Art and Science, is roughly comparable in its power and utility to
nuclear and thermonuclear engineering and physics as physical, objective arts and sciences;
Aleister Crowley (1875-1947), Tantric Magickian and world-shaker par excellence; J. R.
“Bob” Dobbs (1929-1981), founder and martyred First Saint of the Church of the SubGenius,
and notorious Sex-God; Alphonse Capone (1899-1947), the gangster who ruled Chicago in
the 1920s; John Dillinger (?-1934), famous bank-robber and safe-cracker, who died when
gunned down by the FBI in 1934 outside a movie theater in Chicago, and whose you-know-
what, a highly important cultural archetype, is reported to be a prize exhibit in a hidden
room in the Smithsonian Institute, all eight apocryphal inches of it; Charles Manson
(1934-), notorious Sex-Magickian who was tried and convicted of conspiracy to commit
murder in connection with the Tate-La Bianca murders of 1969; Howard Phillips Lovecraft
(1890-1937), the father of the modern literature and cinema of horror and seminal force in
the evolution of modern science-fiction, who was almost certainly extremely knowledgeable
concerning the occult and Sex-Magick; Geoffrey M. Masson (1935?-), whose 1984 expos‚ of
Sigmund Freud, Assault on Truth: Freud’s Suppression of the Seduction Theory, helped
kick off a revolution both in modern attitudes toward psychoanalytic theory and
psychoanalysis as a profession, and in modern views of child-abuse and social reactions to it;
Andrew Vachss (1942-), attorney and author of novels such as Down in the Zero (1994), who
has devoted his life to protecting children and exposing the social evils that bring about their
exploitation, degradation, gross injury, and destruction in body and soul and spirit; Paul
Mones, attorney who has devoted his life to protecting the rights of children, the only one in
the United States who specializes in defending children who kill their parents, professor of
 law, lecturer and public speaker, author of When a Child Kills: Abused Children Who Kill
Their Parents, op. cit.; Adolph Hitler (1889-1945), Nazi dictator and Reichschancellor of
Germany (1933-1945) and “black Thelemite,” one of those responsible for outbreak of World
War II, responsible for the mass-murder of from five to ten million Gypsies, Jews, and Slavs
due to his inception of his program of “the Final Solution,” “racial cleansing”; the late
Rabbi Meier Kahane (?-1992), terrorist, died by assassin’s bullets in New York City,
responsible for an unknown but respectable number of assassinations, alleged author of the
fire-bombing of the Los Angeles offices of the Institute for Historical Research in the 1980s;
Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, A.K.A. Joseph Stalin (1879-1953, Soviet premier (1941-
1953), general secretary of the Communist Party of the U. S. S. R. (1922-1953), responsible
for the deaths of over twenty million people as a result of pogroms of his administrations
carried out against various ethnic minorities within the Soviet Union; Grigori Efimovich
Rasputin (1871?-1916), sexually super-charged Russian religious mystic and faith-healer
whose association with the Romanov dynasty of Russia profoundly influenced the course of
historical events that led to the Russian revolutions of 1917-1918; German war profiteer and
prison-camp Direktor Oskar Schindler (?-1974), who, essentially single-handedly, came to
save more Jews from the gas-chambers than any other individual during World War II;
Joseph McCarthy (?-1957), U. S. Senator (1946-1957) who instigated the Great American
witch-hunt, A.K.A. the Red Scare of the 1940s and 1950s; Ted Bundy, all-American serial
killer who was electrocuted in a Florida State execution-chamber in 1989 for the torture-
murders of a number of female victims from several parts of the United States;* Edward R.
Murrow (1908-1965), radio and television journalist who was famous for his exposés; John
Serpico, who, as an officer of the NYC police department during the 1960s, exposed the
extensive and egregious corruption prevalent in that department during his tenure in it; Ned
Buntline, famous Old West gunsmith; John D. Rockefeller (1839-1937), plutocrat and oil
baron; Julius Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967), U. S. nuclear physicist, director of the
scientific staff of the Manhattan Project, “Father of the Atomic Bomb”; Edward Teller
(1908-), Hungarian-born U.S. nuclear physicist, “Father of the H-Bomb”; Henry Alfred
Kissinger (1923-), German-born U.S. Secretary of State (1973-1977), adept of high-level
power-politics, particularly the politics of oil; the German geologist Alfred Wegener (?-
1920?), father of modern plate tectonics; The Addams family, apocryphal, necrotic, and
hilarious archetypal family created by Chas. Addams of the New Yorker Magazine; John
Davison Rockefeller (1839-1937), U.S. industrialist and philanthropist, founder of Standard
Oil (he was frequently called a plutocrat, because of his enormous wealth, much of it from
oil, which is jointly ruled by Neptune and Pluto); Paul (“Red”) Adair (1915-), legendary fire
and catastrophe technical specialist, because of his mastery over fire;

*It could be argued that he should be associated with Saturn, instead, since Saturn in Scorpio is the
Executioner, a socially-sanctioned killer, of which Bundy was an outlaw, Qlipphotic exemplar. On
the other hand, a little-known detail of the dreaded Mr. Bundy’s life is that while he lived in Seattle,
Washington, long before is apprehension in Florida for the crimes for which he was eventually
executed, he worked as a volunteer for the Seattle Crisis Hotline. His forte was counseling suicidal
callers out of their determination to kill themselves. There are people now living in Seattle, alive,
healthy, and happy, who are only so because Ted Bundy, years ago, counseled them out of committing
suicide. So Neptune could also be said to rule Ted Bundy, especially so, since his crimes were crimes
involving deception of the entire community (not to mention his targeted victims), an archetypally
Neptunian phenomenon.

American emblems, sigils, symbols, folklore, and urban legend:

The Hook (classic urban legend)

Far Eastern cosmological associations:

Attributions from the I Ching and Taoist Cosmology:

Trigrams:

Ch’ien, “The Creative,” Heaven, Void

_______
_______
_______

Li, “The Clinging,” Fire

_______
__ __
_______

Hexagrams:

Ch’ien/The Creative, Heaven above Heaven (Hexagram 1 of the King Wen arrangement);

_______
_______
_______
_______
_______
_______

Li/The Clinging, Fire, Fire above Fire (Hexagram 30 of the King Wen arrangement)
_______
__ __
_______
_______
__ __
_______

Attributions from Ninpo (Way of the Ninja, Way of Wisdom) and Shinto (Way of the Kami or Gods):

The Element of Void (Open Sky), Fire

b. Design and Title of Trump

Gringonneur Tarot:

Bembo Tarot:

Swiss Tarot:

Insight Tarot:

Marseille Tarot:

Italian Tarot:
Wirth Tarot:

Waite Tarot:

B.O.T.A. Tarot:

Aquarius Tarot: Like Waite’s version, except that the cross is of a standard design, and is formed of
living wood.

Crowley Tarot:

New Tarot:

America’s Tarot: Title: The Aeon (following Crowley’s associations). Upright: Images of Alchemy
(Transformation) and Power surrounding Red Adair, the Magus of Fire-Fighting. Reverse: the
Fat Man (the A-bomb that destroyed Nagasaki) in its cradle prior to use. Ghost-over: David
Koresh and the Branch Davidian holocaust of April 19, 1993 e.v., Koresh as Haar-Poor-Kraat.

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Alfred plays an accordion while buildings all around collapse from the
awful racket.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

c. Divinatory Meanings
Case:

Christian:

Crowley:

Douglas:

Gray:

Golden Dawn:

Grimaud:

Huson:

Kahn:

Kaplan:

Knight:
Lind:

Mathers:

Mayananda:

Papus:

Sadhu:

Thierens:

Ussher:

Waite:

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot: OT: NT:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot:

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

General meaning:

d. Interrelationships of the Path and the Trump

 22. Key 32
Tav t, “Tau Cross” (τ or Τ). Trump XII, the World (in the Crowley/Harris pack, its title is the
Universe). The Element Earth ∀ or ; the Planet Saturn Ü; the Planet Earth ï. Cardinal value, 400;
ordinal value 22. Connects Sephirah 9, Yesod, with Sephirah 10, Malkuth. Roman/English equivalents:
T; aspirated T, sounded as Greek θ (Theta); soft “th” sound, as in our words “thing” and “thought.”

[Mention “The Highwayman” by The Highwaymen as a celebration of the Four Elements as manifest in
men’s lives – the Dam Builder is, of course, Earth and Saturn]

a. Qaballistic Meanings and Theory

Tav joins Malkuth, the physical world, with Yesod, the universal collective unconscious and quantum-
mechanical web which forms the foundations of physical existence. It is therefore a Path of introversion,
a retreat from sensory consciousness to the consciousness of the depths of the inner world. Treading it,
one bores down into the unconscious mind, where a plethora of strangeness is encountered.
An excellent allegorical representation of this Path is the rabbit-hole leading to Wonderland down
which Alice fell. This is the way to the Underworld taken by Oedipus at Colonos and Orpheus in search
of his lost love Eurydike, among many others, but it is above all the path of Persephone’s descent into the
world of Hades, Lord of the Underworld. (Alice of Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking-
Glass might be said to be a modern version of Persephone, for Lewis Carroll’s epic tales of Alice
knowingly or not, were about the abyssal deeps of the unconscious mind. Tav is thus also the do of
psychoanalysis.
The importance of Persephone is that she was the daughter of the Earth-mother, Demeter.* Tav is
intimately connected with Earth through the Sephirah Malkuth. It is also linked to Yesod, “Foundation,”
not only the foundation of physical existence but also that of the whole of the higher worlds whose
emanations are reflected in Yesod.

* In Greek mythology Demeter (Greek: Δημήτηρ, Dēmētēr), probably “earth-mother”) was the Goddess of
the harvest, Who presided over grains, the fertility of the earth, the seasons (personified by the
Hours), and the harvest. Though Demeter is often described simply as the goddess of the harvest, She
presided also over the sanctity of marriage, the sacred law, and the cycle of life and death.

Yesod is associated with the Moon, reflective and magnetic, a Sphere of hidden power. In the earliest
known version of the myth of Persephone and Demeter, the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, the nearest
witness to the abduction of Persephone by Hades, apart from the Sun, Who sees all, was Hekate,* Who,
seated in Her cave, heard the cries of the maiden victim. Hekate is a Goddess of the Moon in Her Crone
aspect. There is therefore a strong connection between this myth and the 32 nd Path, Tav, and it is of
relevance here that this myth was the foundation of the teaching of the Eleusinian Mysteries, for inasmuch
as this Path is the way to the inner life it is also the Path of Initiation.

*Hecate or Hekate (ancient Greek Ἑκάτη, Hekátē, in English) is a chthonic Greco-Roman goddess
associated with magic and crossroads. She is attested in poetry as early as Hesiod’s Theogony. An
inscription from late archaic Miletus naming her as a protector of entrances is also testimony to her
presence in archaic Greek religion. Regarding the nature of Her cult, it has been remarked, “she is
more at home on the fringes than in the center of Greek polytheism. Intrinsically ambivalent and
polymorphous, she straddles conventional boundaries and eludes definition.” She has been associated
with childbirth, nurturing the young, gates and walls, doorways, crossroads, magic, lunar lore,
torches and dogs. William Berg observes, “Since children are not called after spooks, it is safe to
assume that Carian theophoric names involving hekat- refer to a major deity free from the dark and
unsavoury ties to the underworld and to witchcraft associated with the Hecate of classical Athens.”
But he cautions, “The Laginetan goddess may have had a more infernal character than scholars have
 been willing to assume.” In Ptolemaic Alexandria and elsewhere during the Hellenistic period, She
appears as a three-faced goddess associated with magic, witchcraft, and curses. Today She is claimed
by neopagans as a goddess of witches and in the context of Hellenic Polytheistic Reconstructionism.
Some neo-pagans refer to Her as a “crone Goddess”, though this characterization appears to conflict
with Her frequent characterization as a virgin in late antiquity. She closely parallels the Roman
goddess Trivia.

The aim of all initiation can be summed up in one word: regeneration. Regeneration is the bringing
to birth of new life, for which reason the initiate is often referred to as the Twice-Born, as opposed to the
non-initiate Once-Born. Such rebirth is the conscious contact of the personality with the individuality,
and, ultimately, with the spirit. The processes of the Second Birth are summed up in the upward line of
the 32nd Path, Tav, and the 25th Path, Samekh (respectively associated with Saturn and Sagittarius), from
Malkuth to Tiphareth, their main colors being the blues of aspiration. The First birth is physical birth,
and could be represented by the downward journey of those Paths, daily life in Malkuth being the nadir of
these two journeys.
The symbolism of the Eleusinian Mysteries was that of the growth of wheat. Wheat, honeybees, and
asbestos are things which are said to have been brought to Earth from Venus by Melchizedik.* The
symbol of wheat applies to Tav as the honeybee and asbestos apply to the other two Paths leading upward
from Malkuth, the honey-bee to the 29 th Path, Qoph, to Netzach, and asbestos to the 31 st Path, Shin, to
Hod. The wheat grows and is then cut down, the sacrifice of John Barleycorn, or even Christ. The grain
that isn’t made into food for humans is sacrificed by burying it in the earth, but it sprouts again in the
Spring, each grain producing yet more grains. It is cut down again come harvest, and the cycle repeats
itself every Solar year. In nature’s cycle, death leads to birth and birth to death, and, in accordance with
the hermetic axiom ‘As above, so below,’ the same process occurs in the human soul. The more obvious
meaning of the symbolism is that Demeter represents the Earth and Persephone the corn, planted, then
remaining under the Earth, apparently dead, until it sprouts once again, when Demeter rejoices, covering
the Earth with growth. But there are aspects of the myth which aren’t as easily accounted for by reference
only to the processes of plant-life.

*Melchizedek (from Hebrew ‫( ַמִכְלצ־יִּכצ־י־ קֶצ קֶד ק‬melech-i-tzédek), literally “righteousness is my king”) is an
enigmatic figure twice mentioned in the Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament). Melchizedek is
mentioned as the King of Salem, and priest of God Most High, in the time of the biblical patriarch
Abram. He brought out bread and wine, blessed Abram, and received tithes from him (Genesis 14:18-
20). Reference is made to him in Psalm 110:4, where the victorious ruler is declared to be “priest
forever after the order of Melchizedek.” He is commemorated as one of the Holy Forefathers in the
Calendar of Saints of the Armenian Apostolic Church on July 26, and is mentioned in the Roman
Canon, the First Eucharistic Prayer of the Roman rite. See discussion under Key 31, § a.,
“Qaballistic Meanings and Theory,” above, for more on Melchizedek.

Persephone, Who at that time was still Koré, a Maiden aspect of the Moon, was carried off by Hades
when She was gathering flowers in a water-meadow near the cave of Hekate. There is a great deal of the
symbolism of Yesod in this myth, appropriate because in human psychology the Underworld is to be found
in the unconscious mind, and the 32 nd Path leads to Yesod. Yesod is the Sephirah whose mundane chakra
is the Moon, because the Moon is the celestial entity which most closely represents the powers of the ninth
Sephirah. The Moon Goddess Hekate, sitting in Her cave nearby, watching as Persephone was abducted
by Hades, is an evocative symbol of the elements of the unconscious lurking beneath all things, witness to
all. And in some accounts the companions of Persephone were Artemis and Aphrodite. Artemis is
another Goddess of the Moon, while Aphrodite, though associated with Venus rather than with Luna, was
born of sea-foam, and is thus strongly connected with water.* There is an intimate connection between
the Moon and Water, and Water plays a prominent part in the myth of Persephone and Hades, for in one
version of it that is probably less altered over the years than others, Persephone’s companions in the lush,
damp, water-meadow were the Oceanids,** the daughters of Oceanus.†
*Astrologically speaking, Venus is the esoteric Lord of the Sign Cancer and is exalted in Pisces.
Originally Aphrodite, the Greek counterpart of Venus, was a Great Mother Goddess, and as such had
Her own cult. The great mother Goddesses are all associated with the Full Moon. It is of interest
here also that Luna, traditional ruler of Cancer, has Her exaltation in Taurus, of which Venus is the
traditional ruler, and is the esoteric ruler of Pisces, in which Venus is exalted.

**The Oceanids were the three thousand daughter-nymphs born to the great Titans, the ancient
grandmother Tethys and Oceanus, the great river with His endless currents surrounding the
earth/universe. (In Greek mythology, Tethys (Greek Τηθύς), daughter of Uranus (Father Sky) and
Gaia (Mother Earth) was an archaic Titaness and aquatic sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek
poetry but not venerated in cult. Tethys was both sister and wife of Oceanus. She was mother of the
chief rivers of the world known to the Greeks, such as the Nile, the Alpheus, the Maeander, and some
three thousand daughters called the Oceanids. Considered as an embodiment of the waters of the
world, She is also related to Thalassa, the embodiment of the sea.) Though the Oceanids were born to
immortal Gods and were aquatic deities who kept their youth and beauty, they weren’t considered
immortal and weren’t perceived fully as Goddesses. Because they were less intimidating than the
Gods, they were viewed as more like tender (most of the time) mediators among Gods, nature, and
humans. Some of them are remembered as individual personalities, mostly thanks to their mothering
abilities and famous offspring, such as Clymene, wife of Helios, the Sun, Who give birth to the
Helides; Elektra, mother of Iris, the Goddess of the Rainbow; the Harpies; Doris, mother of the
Nereids; and Phaethon (In Greek mythology, Phaëtōn or Phaethōn (Greek: Φαέθων, “shining”) was
the son of Helios (Phoebus). Perhaps the most famous version of the myth is given us through Ovid in
his Metamorphoses (Book II). Phaeton sought assurance that his mother, Clymene, was telling the
truth about his father is the Sun God Helios. When Phaeton obtained his father’s promise to let him
drive the solar chariot as proof of his paternity, he could not control the horses pulling it, and the
Earth was thereby put in imminent danger of being consumed by solar fire. To head off such a
disaster, Zeus slew Phaeton with a thunderbolt, which ended the danger to the Earth. The name
“Phaëton” is also an epithet of Clymenus by Merope or Clymene, and of Lucifer, the Morning Star,
i.e., Venus).

†For additional aspects to the symbolism of Oceanus that might be useful here, see Victor Clube and Bill
Napier, The Cosmic Winter (Cambridge, MA: Basil Blackwell, 1990), p. 182 and passim. Oceanus
may originally have been associated not with what we now call the Milky Way, but with the Zodiacal
Light, a trail of dust left over from fragmented comets that can be seen before dawn and after sunset,
streaming upward from the horizon, which at various times in history may have been far larger and
brighter than it is today. The same is true of the term “Milky Way,” which also may have once
applied to the Zodiacal Light rather than to the band of Stars known by that term today.
Oceanus, an ancient Greek river-God, was the spirit of the divine river that girdled the Universe,
giving birth not only to the Oceanids but to all rivers and all stars with the exception of those of the
Great Bear. That association leads into the supernal regions, the great starry river of the Milky Way,
the Waters of Cosmic Space, the Great Sea, Marah, of Binah. Oceanus is a cosmic symbol. The alien
lands bordering His outer shores can be interpreted as the weird worlds of the unconscious mind, but
ultimately they represent outer margins of the Ring-Pass-Not of the Universe and the unconscious
levels of the Logos.
In classical antiquity, Oceanus (from Greek: Οκεανός, lit. “ocean”) was believed to be the world-
ocean, which the ancient Romans and Greeks considered to be an enormous river encircling the
world. Strictly speaking, Oceanus was the ocean-stream at the Equator in which floated the habitable
hemisphere (οκουμένη, oikoumene). In Greek mythology, this world-ocean was personified as a
Titan, a son of Uranus and Gaia. In Hellenistic and Roman mosaics, this Titan was often depicted as
having the upper body of a muscular man with a long beard and horns (often represented as the claws
of a crab), and the lower torso of a serpent (cf. Typhon). On a fragmentary archaic vessel (British
Museum 1971.11-1.1) of ca 580 BC, among the gods arriving at the wedding of Peleus and the sea-
nymph Thetis, is a fish-tailed Oceanus, with a fish in one hand and a serpent in the other, gifts of
bounty and prophecy. In Roman mosaics, such as that from Bardo (illustration, left) he might carry a
steering-oar and cradle a ship.
Some scholars believe that Oceanus originally represented all bodies of salt water, including the
Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, the two largest bodies known to the ancient Greeks.
However, as geography became more accurate, Oceanus came to represent the stranger, more
 unknown waters of the Atlantic Ocean (also called the “Ocean Sea”), while the newcomer of a later
generation, Poseidon, ruled over the Mediterranean.
Oceanus’ consort is his sister Tethys, and from their union came the ocean nymphs, also known
as the three-thousand Oceanids, and all the rivers of the world, fountains, and lakes.
From Kronos, of the race of Titans, the Olympian gods have their birth, and Hera mentions twice
in Iliad book xiv her intended journey “to the ends of the generous earth on a visit to Oceanus,
whence the gods have risen, and Tethys our mother who brought me up kindly in their own house.”

The flowers that Persephone picked in the water-meadow were roses, lilies, crocuses, violets,
hyacinths, and narcissus, for the most part sweet-smelling flowers in line with the attribution of perfumes
associated with Yesod. The flower she was picking when the Underworld opened, disgorging Hades in
His golden chariot drawn by night-black horses, was a narcissus.* The Lord of the Underworld, Hades,
seized Persephone and carried her with him down to His kingdom in His chariot. The Greek conception
of the Underworld, a world of shadowy figures, gives a good image of the shadowy world of the etheric
realm represented by Yesod. However, some hint of the potentialities of death is given in the Roman
name of the Lord of the Underworld, Pluto, which means “wealth.”**

*There is a parallel between the mythology of the youth Narcissus, who peered into a pool of water (the
Magick Mirror of Yesod), saw his own reflection, and fell in love with himself, pining away until the
Gods changed him into the flower that bears his name today, and one of the phrases carved on the
lintel of the entrance to the chamber of the Delphic Oracle, “Know thyself.”

**Pluto is the astrological ruler of all hidden and buried wealth, including buried treasure such as pirate
hoards and things concealed by homeowners who, leaving their homes for a journey, in that way try
to ensure that their possessions won’t be stolen in their absence; the minerals in the soil needed by
cultivars such as wheat, rice, fruit tress, and other plants grown by humans for their food or medicinal
value, without which they cannot grow; and sewage and carrion, which, when they are exposed to the
air or get into the water supply, are sources of dangerous diseases, but are also rich sources of
nitrogen and other nutrients for crops, forbs (herbaceous flowering plants that are not graminoids
(grasses, sedges and rushes)), trees, and other plants, including all those that people and their
livestock depend on for their daily sustenance. These are the true sources of wealth and, ultimately,
the things on which all life depends, because of which Hades, called “Pluto” and “Pluton” (“wealth”)
by the Romans, is the wealthiest of all the Gods and the one with the greatest power. Because it is so
vitally necessary to life, manure has always commanded top prices in agricultural communities. The
modern emphasis on antisepsis, general aversion to the proximity of the dying and handling of the
dead, and the sequestration of human and animal waste in sewers, which necessary to prevent the
spread of deadly diseases such as cholera and typhoid, was not much in evidence before the advent of
the 19th or even the 20th century. Before then, chamber-pots were often emptied directly into the
streets of cities from 2nd-story windows of houses; gutters ran with raw sewage; and rather than being
processed into fertilizer which is then bagged for sale, as we do today in the West, manure, referred to
as “night-soil,” was collected from privies, latrines, and stockyards by “honey-wagons” and spread
raw on the fields of farmers who bought directly from the drivers of the wagons or had subscriptions
for its delivery to their farms. The germ theory of the transmission of epidemic disease only arose in
the 19th century, and its public-health corollary, preventive action to block such transmission from the
start, was not solidly in place even in the West until the 20 th century. It was from cultures
comfortable with the lack of strictures on the handling of corpses and manure that the mythology of
Hades/Pluto came; they knew him as Lord of Vast Treasures, and for good reason, for without the
treasures of manure and carrion He provided, agriculture would have been impossible, and the rise
and spread of civilization across the world could never have taken place.
An odd spin-off of our modern aversion to Pluto’s wealth took the form of the great polio
epidemics that took place in the middle of the 20 th century, before the advent of effective vaccines
against it.
Poliomyelitis, often called polio or infantile paralysis, is an acute viral infectious disease spread
from person to person, primarily via the fecal-oral route. The term derives from the Greek πολιός
(polios), meaning “grey,” µιελός (myelós), “spinal cord,” and the suffix -itis, which denotes
inflammation. Although around 90% of polio infections cause no symptoms at all, affected
individuals can exhibit a range of symptoms if the virus enters the blood stream. In about 1% of
cases the virus enters the central nervous system, preferentially infecting and destroying motor
neurons, leading to muscle weakness and acute flaccid paralysis. Different types of paralysis may
occur, depending on the nerves involved. Spinal polio is the most common form, characterized by
asymmetric paralysis that most often involves the legs. Bulbar polio leads to weakness of muscles
innervated by cranial nerves. Bulbospinal polio is a combination of bulbar and spinal paralysis.
Poliomyelitis was first recognized as a distinct condition by Jakob Heine in 1840. Its causative agent,
poliovirus, was identified in 1908 by Karl Landsteiner. Although major polio epidemics were
unknown before the late 19th century, polio was one of the most dreaded childhood diseases of the
20th century. Polio epidemics have crippled thousands of people, mostly young children; the disease
has caused paralysis and death for much of human history. Polio had existed for thousands of years
quietly as an endemic pathogen until the 1880s, when major epidemics began to occur in Europe;
soon after, widespread epidemics appeared in the United States. By 1910, much of the world
experienced a dramatic increase in polio cases and frequent epidemics became regular events,
primarily in cities during the summer months. These epidemics – which left thousands of children
and adults paralyzed – provided the impetus for a “Great Race” towards the development of a
vaccine. Developed in the 1950s, polio vaccines are credited with reducing the global number of polio
cases per year from many hundreds of thousands to around a thousand. Enhanced vaccination efforts
led by the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and Rotary International could result in global
eradication of the disease.
Naomi Roger’s examination of epidemic polio in the years between 1900 and 1920 is full of the
ironies and inconsistencies that sensitivity to the interdependence of medicine, society and culture
inevitably brings into focus. Her study demonstrates the extraordinary persistence of 19th-century
paradigms connecting disease with unsanitaryenvironmental conditions and unhygienic practices
even in the face of clear evidence that polio was strikingly atypical. Nineteenth-century sanitarians
believed that good health was dependent on the way people lived: proper hygiene, food, fresh air, rest
and exercise prevented illness. Filth, poverty, slums, overcrowding, unsanitary and dissipated
personal habits, and impure sanitation facilities promoted disease. Though bacteriology altered the
emphasis of public health activity, allegedly moving from a broad concern with environmental factors
to a more narrow focus on individual education and treatment, cleanliness and avoiding
contamination by “germs” was also a mainstay of the new approach to health. The traditional
complex of attitudes, which Rogers unfortunately oversimplifies in her theme linking dirt and disease,
was seriously challenged by what epidemiologists gradually learned, but for a long time refused to
assimilate, about the etiology of infantile paralysis. The truth consistently denied was that improved
sanitation and childcare actually contributed to the epidemics of the 20th century by removing
previous pathways of early exposure and subsequent immunity generated by the less than hygienic
living conditions of the past. Hence, poor, immigrant, and working-class children were still likely to
develop immunity to the disease in the first two decades of the 20th century, while middle-class
cleanliness put advantaged children at greater risk.
Moreover, because bacteriological research was not yet sophisticated enough to deal with the
complex virology virology, study of viruses and their role in disease. Many viruses, such as animal
RNA viruses and viruses that infect bacteria, or bacteriophages, have become useful laboratory tools
in genetic studies and in work on the cellular metabolic control of gene expression of polio–indeed
research on polio played a crucial role in developing the specialty of virology–physicians learned
precious little from the laboratory in terms of how to diagnose and treat the disease. Their frustrations
and the idiosyncratic nature of polio’s etiology led public health advocates to fall back on standard
assumptions about poverty, immigrants, dirt and disease. Indeed physicians, public health officials,
researchers, and progressive reformers alike seized on epidemiological models which could explain
inconsistencies without challenging deep-seated assumptions. Such explanations included an
emphasis on insect vectors, contaminated milk, contagious servants and other agents that might
“explain” how infection was spread from the slums. Public health measures were shaped accordingly:
quarantine, shutting down immigrant festivals, restricting mingling across class lines at movie houses
and swimming pools, forbidding possibly infectious children from traveling out of town, attempts to
remove stricken young people from homes to hospitals, massive cleanup and fly swatting campaigns,
closing playgrounds and disinfecting sand piles, and extensive public education efforts were all
colored by mistaken assumptions about who was infectious and who was vulnerable. This material
 speaks powerfully to the ways in which culture shapes science. (See
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Dirt+and+Disease%3A+Polio+before+FDR.-a016108176)
Two polio vaccines are now used throughout the world to combat poliomyelitis (or polio). The
first was developed by Jonas Salk and first tested in 1952. Announced to the world by Salk on April
12, 1955, it consists of an injected dose of inactivated (dead) poliovirus. An oral vaccine was
developed by Albert Sabin using attenuated poliovirus. Human trials of Sabin’s vaccine began in
1957 and it was licensed in 1962. Because there is no long term carrier state for poliovirus in
immunocompetent individuals, polioviruses have no non-primate reservoir in nature, and survival of
the virus in the environment for an extended period of time appears to be remote. Therefore,
interruption of person to person transmission of the virus by vaccination is the critical step in global
polio eradication. The two vaccines have eradicated polio from most countries in the world, and
reduced the worldwide incidence from an estimated 350,000 cases in 1988 to 1,652 cases in 2007.
But before the advent of those vaccines, it was very early exposure to dirt and the organisms within it
that conferred immunity to polio and certain other deadly, pathogen-caused diseases. Ironically,
foreshadowing the rise of such delightful pathogens as Multiply Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus
(MRSA) as the result of the overuse and abuse of powerful antibiotics and antiseptic soaps, sprays,
and washes, the terrifying polio epidemics of the first half of the 20 th century came about because of
the growing awareness of the role played by septic conditions in the spread of epidemic diseases and
public-health campaigns aimed at eradicating such conditions both in public and in private settings,
resulting in the protection of infants and toddlers from the very thing that would have conferred
immunity to polio upon them. In this case, the wealth of Hades – manure and all its corollaries – is
the wealth of immunity from potentially fatal infectious diseases, wealth indeed!

Meanwhile, Demeter grieved for Her daughter. She even appealed unsuccessfully to the Sun, who
had seen it all. The Sun is a symbol of the individuality, the consciousness of Tiphareth, which sees all
that happens to the personality, though it may not have complete or even very much control over it.
Demeter finally sat in sorrow, mourning her daughter by the Well of the Maidens under the shadow of an
olive tree. This image, recalls the symbolism of Binah having to do with the Water Dolorosa, while the
olive tree is sacred to Pallas Athena,* the Goddess of Wisdom, associated with Chokmah. In these are a
representation of the feminine aspects of God.

*Also originally a Great Mother Goddess, in this case, from the Lake Triton region of Libya, ca. 4,000
B.C. At that time She had three aspects: Pallas, the Maiden; Athena, the Warrior-Queen Mother
Goddess; and Medusa, the Crone. See Demetra George, Asteroid Goddesses: The Mythology,
Psychology and Astrology of the Reemerging Feminine (San Diego: ACS Publications, 1986),
Chapter 6 and passim.

The well by which Demeter sat in mourning for Her daughter is a symbol of the 32 nd Path and the way
into the Underworld. and also entails the symbolism of water. Her divine sorrow under the olive tree
recalls to mind Christ’s agony on the Mount of Olives.
In the meantime, in the Underworld, Hades gave Persephone a pomegranate, a symbol of femininity
and fructification, and She partook of it.* By eating of the pomegranate, symbolizing the taking of the
principle of fructification into herself, She bound Herself to return to the Underworld every year, for only
in the descent into the Underworld is new life possible, as life requires death to gain rebirth. For this
reason, as Hades rules over Death and is one of the great judges of the newly dead, Persephone rules over
the return of the soul from Hades’ realm to life in the world of light and air, the process of reincarnation.
Analogously, as Hades rules over the great mass extinctions of the world, Persephone oversees the
evolutionary radiation of new species and whole new clades of living creatures to repopulate the world
after such mass extinctions.** Demeter’s grief, like all grief, was also a species of death, a process of
fallowing which leads to new life. The pomegranate, a fruit full of seeds, is strongly associated with
Yesod; worked into the capitals of the pillars of the Temple of Solomon together with images of the
Kerubim and other Lunar symbolism, it represented the enormous creativity and fertility of God. Another
Goddess associated with this myth is Artemis, the Divine Huntress, a Moon Goddess who protected all
pregnant beasts.†

*An act that hints that perhaps Persephone’s abduction by Hades was staged, a nod to convention and,
perhaps, a politically necessary move designed to cover the fact that rather than being taken
unwillingly to the Underworld by Hades, Persephone fled to Hades to get away from the attentions of
some powerful other male, even Zeus Himself. She may have been in love with Hades all along, and
Her “abduction” may have been in reality an elopement with Him disguised as an abduction by him
for reasons of political expediency.

**An extinction event (also known as: mass extinction; extinction-level event, ELE, or biotic crisis) is a
sharp decrease in the diversity and abundance of macroscopic life. They occur when the rate of
extinction increases with respect to the rate of speciation. Because the majority of diversity and
biomass on earth is microbial, and thus difficult to measure, mass extinctions have little effect on the
total diversity and abundance of life, but rather affect the easily observed component of the biosphere.
Over 98% of species that ever lived are now extinct, but extinction occurs at an uneven rate.
Based on the fossil record, the background rate of extinctions on Earth is about two to five taxonomic
families of marine invertebrates and vertebrates every million years. Marine fossils are mostly used to
measure extinction rates because of their superior fossil record and stratigraphic range compared to
land organisms.
Since life began on Earth, several major mass extinctions have significantly exceeded the
background extinction rate. The most recent, the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event, occurred 65
million years ago, and has attracted more attention than all others as it marks the extinction of nearly
all dinosaur species, which were the dominant animal class of the period. In the past 540 million
years there have been five major events when over 50% of animal species died. There probably were
mass extinctions in the Archean and Proterozoic Eons, but before the Phanerozoic there were no
animals with hard body parts to leave a significant fossil record.
Estimates of the number of major mass extinctions in the last 540 million years range from as
few as five to more than twenty. These differences stem from the threshold chosen for describing an
extinction event as “major”, and the data chosen to measure past diversity.
The classical “Big Five” mass extinctions identified by Jack Sepkoski and David M. Raup in
their 1982 paper are widely agreed upon as some of the most significant: End Cretaceous, End
Triassic, End Permian, Late Devonian, and End Ordovician. These and a selection of other
extinction events are outlined below. The articles about individual mass extinctions describe their
effects in more detail and discuss theories about their causes.

Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event (End Cretaceous or K-T extinction) - 70 to 65 Ma at

the Cretaceous.Maastrichtian-Paleogene.Danian transition interval. About 17% of all
families, 50% of all genera and 75% of species went extinct. It ended the reign of
dinosaurs and opened the way for mammals and birds to become the dominant land
vertebrates. In the seas it reduced the percentage of sessile animals to about 33%. The
K-T extinction was rather uneven – some groups of organisms became extinct, some
suffered heavy losses and some appear to have been only minimally affected.

Triassic–Jurassic extinction event (End Triassic) - 205 Ma at the Triassic-Jurassic transition.

About 23% of all families and 48% of all genera (20% of marine families and 55% of
marine genera) went extinct. Most non-dinosaurian archosaurs, most therapsids, and
most of the large amphibians were eliminated, leaving dinosaurs with little terrestrial
competition. Non-dinosaurian archosaurs continued to dominate aquatic environments,
while non-archosaurian diapsids continued to dominate marine environments. The
Temnospondyl lineage of large amphibians also survived until the Cretaceous in
Australia (e.g., Koolasuchus).

Permian–Triassic extinction event (End Permian) - 251 Ma at the Permian-Triassic

transition. Earth’s largest extinction killed 57% of all families and 83% of all genera
(53% of marine families, 84% of marine genera, about 96% of all marine species and an
estimated 70% of land species) including insects. The evidence of plants is less clear,
 but new taxa became dominant after the extinction. The “Great Dying” had enormous
evolutionary significance: on land, it ended the primacy of mammal-like reptiles. The
recovery of vertebrates took 30 million years, but the vacant niches created the
opportunity for archosaurs to become ascendant. In the seas, the percentage of animals
that were sessile dropped from 67% to 50%. The whole late Permian was a difficult time
for at least marine life, even before the “Great Dying”.

Late Devonian extinction - 360-375 Ma near the Devonian-Carboniferous transition. At the

end of the Frasnian Age in the later part(s) of the Devonian Period, a prolonged series of
extinctions eliminated about 19% of all families, 50% of all genera and 70% of all
species. This extinction event lasted perhaps as long as 20 MY, and there is evidence
for a series of extinction pulses within this period.

Ordovician–Silurian extinction event (End Ordovician) - 440-450 Ma at the Ordovician-

Silurian transition. Two events occurred that killed off 27% of all families and 57% of
all genera. Together they are ranked by many scientists as the second largest of the five
major extinctions in Earth’s history in terms of percentage of genera that went extinct.

The older the fossil record gets, the more difficult it is to read. This is because:
Older fossils are harder to find because they are usually buried at a considerable depth in the
rock.
Dating older fossils is more difficult.
Productive fossil beds are researched more than unproductive ones, therefore leaving certain
periods unresearched or underresearched.
Prehistoric environmental disturbances can disturb the deposition process.
The preservation of fossils varies on land, but marine fossils tend to be better preserved than their
sought after land-based counterparts.
It has been suggested that the apparent variations in marine biodiversity may actually be an
artifact, with abundance estimates directly related to quantity of rock available for sampling from
different time periods. However, statistical analysis shows that this can only account for 50% of the
observed pattern, and other evidence (such as fungal spikes) provides reassurance that most widely
accepted extinction events are indeed real. A quantification of the rock exposure of Western Europe
does indicate that many of the minor events for which a biological explanation has been sought are
most readily explained by sampling bias.
Lesser extinction events include:

Precambrian

End-Ediacaran extinction - circa 542 Ma

Cambrian Period

End Botomian - circa 517 Ma

Dresbachian event - circa 502 Ma
Cambro-Ordovician extinction event - circa 488 Ma
Silurian Period

Ireviken event - circa 428 Ma

Mulde event - circa 424 Ma
Lau event - circa 420 Ma
End Silurian - circa 416 Ma
Carboniferous Period

Middle Carboniferous - circa 318 Ma

Jurassic Period

Toarcian turnover - circa 183 Ma

End Jurassic - circa 145.5 Ma
Cretaceous Period
 Aptian extinction - circa 117 Ma
Cenomanian-Turonian - circa 93.5 Ma (extinction of ichthyosaurs and pliosaurs)
Paleogene Period

Eocene-Oligocene extinction event- circa 33.9 Ma

Neogene Period

Middle Miocene disruption - circa 14.5 Ma

Quaternary extinction event - circa 50,000 BP to present
Holocene extinction - circa 10,000 BP to present

Mass extinctions have sometimes accelerated the evolution of life on Earth. When dominance of
particular ecological niches passes from one group of organisms to another, it is rarely because the
new dominant group is “superior” to the old and usually because an extinction event eliminates the
old dominant group and makes way for the new one.
For example mammaliformes (‘almost mammals”) and then mammals existed throughout the
reign of the dinosaurs, but could not compete for the large terrestrial vertebrate niches which
dinosaurs monopolized. The end-Cretaceous mass extinction removed the non-avian dinosaurs and
made it possible for mammals to expand into the large terrestrial vertebrate niches. Ironically, the
dinosaurs themselves had been beneficiaries of a previous mass extinction, the end-Triassic, which
eliminated most of their chief rivals, the crurotarsans.
Another point of view put forward in the Escalation hypothesis predicts that species in ecological
niches with more organism-to-organism conflict will be less likely to survive extinctions. This is
because the very traits that keep a species numerous and viable under fairly static conditions become a
burden once population levels fall among competing organisms during the dynamics of an extinction
event.
Furthermore, many groups which survive mass extinctions do not recover in numbers or
diversity, and many of these go into long-term decline, and these are often referred to as “Dead
Clades Walking.” So analyzing extinctions in terms of “what died and what survived” often fails to
tell the full story.
The gaps between mass extinctions appear to be becoming longer, while the average and
background rates of extinction are decreasing. Mass extinctions are thought to result when a long-
term stress is compounded by a short term shock. Over the course of the Phanerozoic, individual taxa
appear to be less likely to become extinct at any time, which may reflect more robust food webs as
well as less extinction-prone species and other factors such as continental distribution. However the
taxonomic susceptibility to extinction does not appear to make mass extinctions more or less
probable.
The idea that mass extinctions are becoming less frequent is rather speculative – from a
statistical point of view a sample of about 10 extinction events is too small to be a reliable sign of any
actual trend.
Both of these phenomena could be explained in one or more ways:
Reasonably complete fossils are very rare, most extinct organisms are represented only by partial
fossils, and complete fossils are rarest in the oldest rocks. So paleontologists have mistakenly
assigned parts of the same organism to different genera which were often defined solely to
accommodate these finds (an example is the story of Anomalocaris). The risk of this mistake is higher
for older fossils because these are often unlike parts of any living organism. Many of the
“superfluous” genera are represented by fragments which are not found again and the “superfluous”
genera appear to become extinct very quickly.
Martin (1994, 1996) has argued that the oceans have become more hospitable to life over the last
500M years and less vulnerable to mass extinctions: dissolved oxygen became more widespread and
penetrated to greater depths; the development of life on land reduced the run-off of nutrients and
hence the risk of eutrophication and anoxic events; and marine ecosystems became more diversified
so that food chains were less likely to be disrupted.
There is still debate about the causes of all mass extinctions. In general, large extinctions may
result when a biosphere under long-term stress undergoes a short-term shock.
A good theory for a particular mass extinction should: (1) explain all of the losses, not just focus
on a few groups (such as dinosaurs); (2) explain why particular groups of organisms died out and why
others survived; (3) provide mechanisms which are strong enough to cause a mass extinction but not
a total extinction; (4) be based on events or processes that can be shown to have happened, not just
inferred from the extinction.
It may be necessary to consider combinations of causes. For example the marine aspect of the
end-Cretaceous extinction appears to have been caused by several processes which partially
overlapped in time and may have had different levels of significance in different parts of the world.
Arens and West (2006) proposed a “press / pulse” model in which mass extinctions generally
require two types of cause: long-term pressure on the eco-system (“press”) and a sudden catastrophe
(“pulse”) towards the end of the period of pressure. Their statistical analysis of marine extinction
rates throughout the Phanerozoic suggested that neither long-term pressure alone nor a catastrophe
alone was sufficient to cause a significant increase in the extinction rate.
Macleod (2001) summarized the relationship between mass extinctions and events which are
most often cited as causes of mass extinctions, using data from Courtillot et al. (1996), Hallam (1992)
and Grieve et al. (1996):

Flood basalt events: 11 occurrences, all associated with significant extinctions. But Wignall
(2001) concluded that only five of the major extinctions coincided with flood basalt
eruptions and that the main phase of extinctions started before the eruptions.
Sea-level falls: 12, of which seven were associated with significant extinctions.
Asteroid impacts producing craters over 100 km wide: one, associated with one mass
extinction.
Asteroid impacts producing craters less than 100 km wide: over 50, the great majority not
associated with significant extinctions.

The most commonly suggested causes of mass extinctions are:

Flood basalt events: The formation of large igneous provinces by flood basalt events could
have:

produced dust and particulate aerosols which inhibited photosynthesis and thus caused
food chains to collapse both on land and at sea
emitted sulfur oxides which were precipitated as acid rain and poisoned many
organisms, contributing further to the collapse of food chains
emitted carbon dioxide and thus possibly causing sustained global warming once the
dust and particulate aerosols dissipated.

Flood basalt events occur as pulses of activity punctuated by dormant periods. As a

result they are likely to cause the climate to oscillate between cooling and warming, but
with an overall trend towards warming as the carbon dioxide they emit can stay in the
atmosphere for hundreds of years.

Massive volcanism may have caused or contributed to the End-Cretaceous, End-Permian,

and End Triassic extinctions.

Sea-level falls: These are often clearly marked by worldwide sequences of contemporaneous
sediments which show all or part of a transition from sea-bed to tidal zone to beach to
dry land - and where there is no evidence that the rocks in the relevant areas were raised
by geological processes such as orogeny. Sea-level falls could reduce the continental
shelf area (the most productive part of the oceans) sufficiently to cause a marine mass
extinction, and could disrupt weather patterns enough to cause extinctions on land. But
sea-level falls are very probably the result of other events, such as sustained global
cooling or the sinking of the mid-ocean ridges. Sea-level falls are associated with most
of the mass extinctions, including all of the “Big Five” – End-Ordovician, Late
Devonian, End-Permian, End-Triassic, and End-Cretaceous. A study, published in the
journal Nature (online June 15, 2008) established a relationship between the speed of
mass extinction events and changes in sea level and sediment. The study suggests
changes in ocean environments related to sea level exert a driving influence on rates of
extinction, and generally determine the composition of life in the oceans.
Impact events: The impact of a sufficiently large asteroid or comet could have caused food
chains to collapse both on land and at sea by producing dust and particulate aerosols and
thus inhibiting photosynthesis. Impacts on sulfur-rich rocks could have emitted sulfur
oxides precipitating as poisonous acid rain, contributing further to the collapse of food
chains. Such impacts could also have caused megatsunamis and / or global forest fires.
Most paleontologists now agree that an asteroid did hit the Earth about 65 Ma, but there
is an ongoing dispute whether the impact was the sole cause of the extinctions. There is
evidence that there was an interval of about 300 ka from the impact to the mass
extinction. In 1997, paleontologist Sankar Chatterjee drew attention to the proposed
and much larger 600 km (370 mi) Shiva crater and the possibility of a multiple-impact
scenario. In 2007, a hypothesis was put forth that argued the impactor that killed the
dinosaurs 65 Ma years ago belonged to the Baptistina family of asteroids. Concerns have
been raised regarding the reputed link, in part because very few solid observational
constraints exist of the asteroid or family. Indeed, it was recently discovered that 298
Baptistina does not share the same chemical signature as the source of the K-T impact.
Although this finding may make the link between the Baptistina family and K-T
impactor more difficult to substantiate, it does not preclude the possibility. In 2010,
another hypothesis was offered which implicated the newly-discovered asteroid P/2010
A2, a member of the Flora family of asteroids, as a possible remnant cohort of the K/T
impactor.

Sustained and significant global cooling: Sustained global cooling could kill many polar and
temperate species and force others to migrate towards the equator; reduce the area
available for tropical species; often make the Earth’s climate more arid on average,
mainly by locking up more of the planet’s water in ice and snow. The glaciation cycles
of the current ice age are believed to have had only a very mild impact on biodiversity,
so the mere existence of a significant cooling is not sufficient on its own to explain a
mass extinction. It has been suggested that global cooling caused or contributed to the
End-Ordovician, Permian-Triassic, Late Devonian extinctions, and possibly others.
Sustained global cooling is distinguished from the temporary climatic effects of flood
basalt events or impacts.

Sustained and significant global warming: This would have the opposite effects: expand the
area available for tropical species; kill temperate species or force them to migrate
towards the poles; possibly cause severe extinctions of polar species; often make the
Earth’s climate wetter on average, mainly by melting ice and snow and thus increasing
the volume of the water cycle. It might also cause anoxic events in the oceans (see
below). Global warming as a cause of mass extinction is supported by several recent
studies. The most dramatic example of sustained warming is the Paleocene-Eocene
Thermal Maximum, which was associated with one of the smaller mass extinctions. It
has also been suggested to have caused the Triassic-Jurassic extinction event, during
which 20% of all marine families went extinct. Furthermore, the Permian–Triassic
extinction event has been suggested to have been caused by warming.

Clathrate gun hypothesis: Clathrates are composites in which a lattice of one substance
forms a cage round another. Methane clathrates (in which water molecules are the cage)
form on continental shelves. These clathrates are likely to break up rapidly and release
the methane if the temperature rises quickly or the pressure on them drops quickly –
for example in response to sudden global warming or a sudden drop in sea level or even
earthquakes. Methane is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, so
a methane eruption (“clathrate gun”) could cause rapid global warming or make it much
more severe if the eruption was itself caused by global warming. The most likely
signature of such a methane eruption would be a sudden decrease in the ratio of carbon-
13 to carbon-12 in sediments, since methane clathrates are low in carbon-13; but the
change would have to be very large, as other events can also reduce the percentage of
carbon-13. It has been suggested that “clathrate gun” methane eruptions were involved
 in the end-Permian extinction (“the Great Dying”) and in the Paleocene-Eocene
Thermal Maximum, which was associated with one of the smaller mass extinctions.

Anoxic events: Anoxic events are situations in which the middle and even the upper layers
of the ocean become deficient or totally lacking in oxygen. Their causes are complex and
controversial, but all known instances are associated with severe and sustained global
warming, mostly caused by sustained massive volcanism. It has been suggested that
anoxic events caused or contributed to the Ordovician–Silurian, late Devonian, Permian-
Triassic and Triassic-Jurassic extinctions, as well as a number of lesser extinctions (such
as the Ireviken, Mulde, Lau, Toarcian and Cenomanian-Turonian events). On the other
hand, there are widespread black shale beds from the mid-Cretaceous which indicate
anoxic events but are not associated with mass extinctions.

Hydrogen sulfide emissions from the seas: Kump, Pavlov and Arthur (2005) have proposed
that during the Permian-Triassic extinction event the warming also upset the oceanic
balance between photosynthesising plankton and deep-water sulfate-reducing bacteria,
causing massive emissions of hydrogen sulfide which poisoned life on both land and sea
and severely weakened the ozone layer, exposing much of the life that still remained to
fatal levels of UV radiation.

Oceanic overturn: Oceanic overturn is a disruption of thermo-haline circulation which lets

surface water (which is more saline than deep water because of evaporation) sink
straight down, bringing anoxic deep water to the surface and therefore killing most of
the oxygen-breathing organisms which inhabit the surface and middle depths. It may
occur either at the beginning or the end of a glaciation, although an overturn at the start
of a glaciation is more dangerous because the preceding warm period will have created a
larger volume of anoxic water. Unlike other oceanic catastrophes such as regressions
(sea-level falls) and anoxic events, overturns do not leave easily-identified “signatures”
in rocks and are theoretical consequences of researchers’ conclusions about other
climatic and marine events. It has been suggested that oceanic overturn caused or
contributed to the late Devonian and Permian-Triassic extinctions.

A nearby nova, supernova or gamma ray burst: A nearby gamma ray burst (less than 6000
light years away) could sufficiently irradiate the surface of Earth to kill organisms living
there and destroy the ozone layer in the process. From statistical arguments,
approximately one gamma ray burst would be expected to occur close to Earth in the last
540 million years. A proposal that a supernova or gamma ray burst had caused a mass
extinction would also have to be backed up by astronomical evidence of such an
explosion at the right place and time. It has been suggested that a supernova or gamma
ray burst caused the End-Ordovician extinction.

Continental drift: Movement of the continents into some configurations can cause or
contribute to extinctions in several ways: by initiating or ending ice ages; by changing
ocean and wind currents and thus altering climate; by opening seaways or land bridges
which expose previously isolated species to competition for which they are poorly-
adapted (for example, the extinction of most of South America’s native ungulates and
all of its large metatherians after the creation of a land bridge between North and South
America). Occasionally continental drift creates a super-continent which includes the
vast majority of Earth’s land area, which in addition to the effects listed above is likely
to reduce the total area of continental shelf (the most species-rich part of the ocean) and
produce a vast, arid continental interior which may have extreme seasonal variations. It
is widely thought that the creation of the super-continent Pangaea contributed to the
End-Permian mass extinction. Pangaea was almost fully formed at the transition from
mid-Permian to late-Permian, and the “Marine genus diversity” diagram at the top of
this article shows a level of extinction starting at that time which might have qualified
for inclusion in the “Big Five” if it were not overshadowed by the “Great Dying” at the
end of the Permian.
 Plate tectonics: Plate tectonics is the mechanism which drives many of the possible causes of
mass extinctions, especially volcanism and continental drift. So it is implicated in many
extinctions, but in each case it is necessary to specify which manifestations of plate
tectonics were involved.

Other hypotheses: Many other hypotheses have been proposed, such as the spread of a new
disease, the Shiva hypothesis, or simple out-competition following an especially
successful biological innovation. But all have been rejected, usually for one of the
following reasons: they require events or processes for which there is no evidence; they
assume mechanisms which are contrary to the available evidence; they are based on
other theories which have been rejected or superseded.

Postulated extinction cycles: It has been suggested by several sources that biodiversity and/or
extinction events may be influenced by cyclic processes. The best-known hypothesis of extinction
events by a cyclic process is the 26M to 30M year cycle in extinctions proposed by Raup and Sepkoski
(1986). More recently, Rohde and Muller (2005) have suggested that biodiversity fluctuates primarily
on 62 ± 3 million year cycles. It is difficult to evaluate the validity of such claims except through
reduction to statistical arguments about how plausible or implausible it is for the observed data to
exhibit a particular pattern, as the causes of most extinction events are still too uncertain to attribute
to them any specific cause let alone a recurring one. Much early work in this area also suffered from
the poor accuracy of geological dating, where errors often exceed 10M years. However, improvements
in radiometric dating have reduced the scale of uncertainty to at most 4M years – theoretically
adequate for studying these processes. While the statistics alone have been judged as sufficiently
compelling to warrant publication, it is important to consider processes that might be responsible for
a cyclic pattern of extinctions and future work may focus on trying to find evidence of such processes.

Hypothetical companion star to the Sun: The physicist Richard A. Muller has produced a
number of speculative hypotheses for the regularity of mass extinctions. One is that the
extinction cycle could be caused by the orbit of a hypothetical companion star dubbed
Nemesis that periodically disturbs the Oort cloud, sending storms of large asteroids and
comets towards the Solar System. One recent study claims the regularity of extinctions is
within a 99% confidence interval, and that were Nemesis to actually exist, such regularity
wouldn’t be possible as a star in the Oort Cloud would likely have its orbit disturbed by
extrasolar forces acting upon it.

Galactic plane oscillations: Muller has also speculated the periodicity of mass extinctions may be
related to the solar system’s oscillation through the plane of our Milky Way galaxy as it
rotates around the galactic center, with a number of possible hypothesized effects including
gravitationally-induced comet showers or periods of intense radiation as the solar system hits
the galactic shock wave.

Passage through galactic spiral arms: It has also been suggested that extinction events correlate
to the passage of the solar system through the spiral arms of the Milky Way. The Earth
passes through all four arms every 700 million years, and there is some evidence to suggest a
cyclicity of extraterrestrial activity back to 2 billion years ago.

Geological instabilities: Other hypotheses are that geological instabilities allow heat to
periodically build up deep in the Earth, which is then released through mantle plumes,
periods of major volcanism and active plate tectonics.

Effects of mass extinctions: The impact of mass extinction events have varied widely. The worst
event, the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event, devastated life on earth and is estimated to have killed
off over 90% of species. Life on Earth seemed to recover quickly after this extinction, but this was
mostly in the form of disaster taxa, such as the hardy Lystrosaurus. The most recent research
indicates that the specialized animals that formed complex ecosystems, with high biodiversity,
complex food webs and a variety of niches, took much longer to recover. It is thought that this long
recovery was due to the successive waves of extinction which inhibited recovery, as well as to
prolonged environmental stress to organisms which continued into the Early Triassic. Recent
 research indicates that recovery did not begin until the start of the mid-Triassic, 4M to 6M years after
the extinction;[58] and some writers estimate that the recovery was not complete until 30M years
after the P-Tr extinction, i.e. in the late Triassic.
Both Saturn and Earth – Earth the objective living world as well as the world of concrete
experience – are associated with Tav. Mass extinctions and subsequent evolutionary radiation in their
aftermath have shaped Earth and her life over four billion years, and our growing knowledge and
understanding of such global disasters and their implications are essential aspects of our entire
species’ treading of Tav in both directions. This is especially true now because of the so-called Sixth
Extinction, the ongoing mass extinction due in great part or entirely to anthropogenic causes.
Beginning tens of thousand or even hundreds of thousands of years ago as a result of the hunting and
other activities of our remote ancestors and their migrations across the face of the Earth, this growing
biotic crisis has begun to affect living communities of organisms of all descriptions everywhere on
Earth, including marine as well as terrestrial communities. Our heaviest impact is on the most
fragile ecosystems, but we have also done great damage to extremely diverse and vibrantly robust
regions such as tropical rainforests. Even on a microscopic level we have not left the world
unmarked; our indiscriminate use of antiseptics, antibiotics, and pesticides has radically changed
microbial communities and parasite mixes everywhere on Earth, and will do so to a greater and
greater extent in the future as our ever-expanding numbers forces us to tackle epidemiological and
public health crises head on with whatever weapons we have in our arsenal for combating the sources
of those crises. The more we know about past mass extinctions, their causes, and their implications,
the better prepared we will be to limit the damage we do to our world and even, when possible, repair
it. For our own sakes as well as that of everything else on Earth, we must learn as much as we can
about the natural history of our world and the limits – ruled by Saturn – of our ability and that of life
as a whole to recover from the insults we have presented to our living world.

†Artemis was one of the most widely venerated of the Ancient Greek deities. Some scholars believe that
the name, and indeed the goddess herself, was originally pre-Greek. Homer refers to her as Artemis
Agrotera, Potnia Theron “Artemis of the wildland, Mistress of Animals”. In the classical period of
Greek mythology, Artemis (Greek: (nominative) Αρτεμις, (genitive) Αρτέμιδος) was often described
as the daughter of Zeus and Leto, and the twin sister of Apollo. She was the Hellenic Goddess of the
hunt, wild animals, wilderness, childbirth, virginity and young girls, bringing and relieving disease in
women; She was often imaged as a huntress carrying a bow and arrows. The deer and the cypress
were sacred to Her. In later Hellenistic times, She even assumed the ancient role of Eileithyia in
aiding childbirth. Artemis later became identified with Selene, a Titaness who was a Greek Moon
Goddess, sometimes depicted with a crescent moon above Her head. She was also identified with the
Roman goddess Diana, with the Etruscan goddess Artume, and with the Greek or Carian goddess
Hekate.

The symbolism of pregnancy and new life was also carried into the Eleusinian Mystery symbolism in
that pregnant sows were sacrificed to Demeter as well as fragments of decaying pork, which were later
dug into the ground. Decaying matter is the basis for new growth.
Death and decay are under the presidency of the Fourth Aspect of God, God the Disintegrator,* the
other aspects being God the Father, God the Sun and God the Holy Spirit. On the 32 nd Path the
symbolism is very predominantly feminine. Here the feminine aspects of God predominate, and instead of
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, we have the Mother (Matron), the Daughter (Maiden), and the
wisdom of the Grandmother.**

*Originally this, too, was connected with the Moon. Astrologically speaking, the Moon brings all things
into being and also eventually destroys or decomposes them. The Great Mother Goddess of India,
Durga, also has Her Destroyer Aspects: Kali, Chandi, and Parvati. Kali, Goddess of War and Battle
as well as of Plague, is a Goddess of the Eclipse, especially of the total eclipse of the Sun; Her
husband, Shiva, the Destroyer, is a God of the Full Moon. The same symbolism applies to Pallas
Athena, Whose Crone or Destroyer aspect is Medusa; to Persephone Herself, wife of Hades, the Lord
of Death; to Ezelie, the Voudon Goddess of Justice and Love, Who, like Kali and Venus Victrix, is
 also a Goddess of Battle as well as the wife of Baron Samedhi, Lord of Death; the Egyptian Goddess
Isis, Whose crone aspect is Black Isis, and Goddess of Vengeance and Retribution; and Diana or
Artemis of the Classical World, the name of Whose Crone aspect, Hekate, means One Hundred,
referring to Diana Far-Shot, the Huntress, Whose great hunting-bow could shoot arrows one hundred
stadia or more. Of interest here is the astrological relationship between Luna and Saturn, the Lord of
the 32nd Path. On the average, transiting Saturn moves at roughly the same speed through the sky as
progressed Luna, about 2½° per month or one Sign every 2½ years. Like the Waning Moon, Saturn
destroys and otherwise rules all manner of evils. Saturn is also the traditional Lord of Binah, the
Mother, the Great Sea. This is yet another set of correspondences between this Path and the Moon.
There is a curious correspondence here in the biological realm. The cnidaria or coelenterates –
members of phylum Cnidaria – are invertebrate animals, mostly marine, including jellyfish,
hydrozoans, and anthozoans, characterized by stinging cells and a saclike body cavity with a single
opening for both ingesting food and eliminating wastes. Some members of this phylum have an odd,
two-phase reproductive strategy involving alternating generations of asexual and sexual forms. One
generation is an asexual hydrozoan form, resembling tiny versions of the monster Hydra that was
slain by the hero Herakles (if one of her many venomous heads was severed from her body, one or
more would grow back in its place; Herakles killed her by using a torch to cauterize the stump after
he cut off one of her heads, so a replacement couldn’t grow back, and eventually managed in this way
to cut off all her heads and do her in). This form is sessile, occupying a territory which it defends
from others of its kind, eating and growing until it reaches reproductive maturity. At that time, it
buds off gametes, haploid sexual forms, some of which are male and some female. These sexual
forms are motile, and often move great distances from their parent’s home territory before taking
mates, reproducing, and dying. They eat little before this time; their value for the species is
essentially reproductive, and once they have reproduced they die off, because otherwise they would
consume food and other resources needed by their offspring. Because they move far from their
birthplace before mating, however, they also ensure that their offspring are likely to begin life in areas
far from others of their kind, giving them a free field to establish themselves and grow to maturity
during the most vulnerable phase of their lives. Their offspring are not the jellyfish-like sexual
forms like their parents; instead, they are asexual hydra-like forms, like their grandparents. It is of
interest here that the sexual phase of such organisms is called the medusa, in contrast to the
alternating, asexual phase of the species. In connection with the myth of Medusa and Her historical
relation to Pallas Athena, by Classical times Pallas Athena was universally regarded as the Virgin
Goddess, i.e., as asexual. As related in the myth of Perseus, Medusa had as Her lover Poseidon, Who
was frequently at loggerheads with Athena in many of the myths, jealous of Her following and always
conniving to get it for Himself. Pallas Athena became enraged when She learned that Medusa
consummated Her tryst with Poseidon in one of Athena’s own temples. To avenge Herself on Medusa
for this sacrilege, Athena equipped the hero Perseus with various weapons and words of wisdom and
sent him out to kill Medusa, Who had already been changed into a horrible monster by Athena as
well, by means of a curse. Perseus managed to kill Medusa successfully, trapping her in a temple of
Poseidon. In Her death-throes, Medusa gave birth to twin children, sired on her by Poseidon, a
beautiful winged horse, Pegasus, and the hero Chrysaor, whose weapon was a sword shaped like the
Crescent Moon. Biology recapitulates history, apparently, at least as far as nomenclature of the
science goes; the sexual phase of the aforementioned coelenterate is called a medusa, as opposed to
its asexual phase, just as, by Classical times, the sexual or Crone aspect of Pallas Athena, Medusa,
had become culturally alienated from Her asexual aspects!
For more on the Greek religious stories concerning Pallas Athena and Medusa, see Robert
Graves, The Greek Myths (in two volumes. New York: Penguin Books, 1955, 1960), especially
Chapters 25 (Volume I, pp. 96-100) and 73 (Volume I, pp. 237-244).

**The Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost may have been a patriarchist revision of the Triune
Goddess of all ancient human cultures, which comprised Crone or Hag (Destroyer/Protector), Matron,
and Maiden or Virgin. In that case, the symbolism is exactly the same: God the Father is the Full
Moon, God the Son is the Young or Waxing Moon, God the Holy Ghost is the New Moon, and God
the Destroyer is the Waning Moon. The Gnostic Quartet of God the Father, Mary the Mother, Jesus
the Son, and Shekina or Sophia the (Feminine) Holy Spirit transcends both these matriarchist and
patriarchist configurations of God, combining Masculine and Feminine in a balanced way,
symbolized by the formula Yod-Heh-Vav-Heh (IHVH), which can be easily associated with the Tree
of Life as follows: Father-God = Chokmah; Mother-Goddess = Binah; God the Son = Tiphareth;
 and the Divine Daughter, Sophia, as Malkuth. In the Tarot, these are respectively symbolized by the
Knights, the Queens, the Kings, and the Pages of the Court Cards; the Deuces, Treys, Sixes, and
Tens of the Lower Arcana; and Trumps IX, IV, VI, and IV’ of the Major Arcana.

In feminine terms, the Fourth aspect of God is best symbolized by the Medusa, who had a wild, cold
beauty that no man could bear to look upon without the shield of Divine Wisdom, Pallas Athena. Lacking
the ability to look calmly and clearly at the beautiful and terrible face, men were turned to stone; they fell
into the mortal idea of death. *

*See Demetra George, op. cit., concerning the relationship between Pallas Athena and Medusa. Medusa
seems to be the wild, uncontrolled or unconscious aspect of Pallas Athena, Pallas Athena in Her
aspect as the Destroyer or as the fearsome Crone Who is in control of inconceivably powerful and
frightening Magick, assumed by calling up Kundalini energy via Tantric Magick or the use of strange
drugs. Magick of that sort is something that destroys the practitioner unless he or she is prepared in
advanced by the acquisition of true Athenian wisdom and perspective. (There is also a much bawdier
interpretation of the Medusa: that aspect of Woman quite capable of turning certain parts of men
into stone, in which condition they – let’s just say that such is the case of the Little Head doing all the
thinking instead of the Big Head .

As all the Gods are aspects of one God so are all the goddesses aspects of one Goddess, and the one
God and the one Goddess are of course the two sides of the same God, the androgynous Elohim of
Genesis.
In the fragments of a rite of Isis given in Dion Fortune’s novels The Sea Priestess and Moon Magic,
the all-inclusiveness of the feminine aspects of God is given as follows:

I am she who ere the earth was formed

Was Rhea, Binah, Ge.
I am that soundless, boundless, bitter sea
Out of whose deeps life wells eternally.
Astarte, Aphrodite, Ashtoreth
Giver of life and bringer-in of death;
Hera in heaven, on earth Persephone;
Diana of the Ways and Hekate.
All these am I and they are seen in me.

And the same source also gives a version of the entrance to the 32 nd Path:

Sink down, sink down, sink deeper and more deep

Into eternal and primordial sleep.
Sink down, be still, forget and draw apart
Into the inner earth’s most secret heart.
Drink of the waters of Persephone,
The secret well beside the sacred tree . . .
Who drinks the waters of that hidden well
Shall see the things whereof he dare not tell –
Shall tread the shadowy path that leads to me –
Diana of the Ways and Hecate,
Selene of the Moon, Persephone.
 The spiritual polarity of sex has the most direct relevance to the 32 nd Path. While a knowledge of the
spiritual factors is necessary for an understanding of a path this is no substitute for experience, which,
when on the lower levels of the Tree, must and should be of Earth, earthy, quotidian, and unpretentious.
But the sensory world applies in the main to Malkuth, while Tav is an Inner Way, although still very
much connected with the Earth and quotidian experience. On the personal level, Demeter is a part of the
self, as is Persephone and, indeed, are all the Gods. From one point of view, in the myth of Persephone
the Sun represents the individuality looking down upon all that happens as a portion of the personality
(Persephone) is drawn into the unconscious depths, seemingly to be destroyed, to the grief of the rest of
the personality (Demeter), only to re-emerge later, like the Spring corn, bearing life even more
abundantly. In Christian terms the myth is expressed in terms of the agony, trial, crucifixion and descent
into Hell of Christ, followed by his resurrection and ascension.
This story is basic to eternally relevant principles of psychospiritual reality, for which reason it
appears again and again in different guises in accordance with the imaginative needs of times, places, and
socieites. It is a process of withdrawal and return that is dealt with at some length in P. W. Martin’s
“Experiment in Depth,” the poetry of T. S. Eliot, and the historical work of A. J. Toynbee. Toynbee’s
thesis is that at a time of crisis in any civilization certain individuals turn from the outer world to the
inner life of the psyche. Discovering there a new way of life, they return to the outer world to form a
creative minority which acts as a leaven for the renewal of that civilization.
The process is also summarized in a portion of the rite of Isis:

In death men go to her (Persephone) across the shadowy river, for she is the keeper
of their souls until the dawn. But there is also a death in life, and this likewise leadeth
on to rebirth. Why fear ye the Dark Queen, O men? She is the Renewer. From sleep
we arise reborn; by the embraces of Persephone are men made powerful.
For there is a turning-within of the soul whereby men come to Persephone; they
sink back into the womb of time; they become as the unborn; they enter into the
kingdom where she rules as queen; they are made negative and await the coming of life.
And the Queen of Hades cometh unto them as a bridegroom, and they are made
fertile for life and go forth rejoicing, for the touch of the Queen of the Kingdoms of
Sleep hath made them potent.*

*See Part 11 of Volume II, Book 2 of my textbook on the esoteric Arts and Sciences, New Magicks for a
New Age, on Persephone and the Sephirah Hod-i = √-1.

It is obvious from this that the Path of Return is as important as the Path of withdrawal. In other
words, the 32nd path has to be trodden both ways – the withdrawal from Malkuth to Yesod, and the return
from Yesod to Malkuth. Many believe that It is the refusal to come down to Earth, to ground oneself in
quotidian, hands-on experience, that is the cause of a great deal of spiritual pathology – the root of sin,
disease, and ignorance. One writer in the esoteric fields believed it was

the real blasphemy, a rejection of the work of the Father in Heaven, a rejection of the
Universe. (The Universe, let it be noted, is the Tarot Trump of this Path.) Until
physical existence in the Universe is willingly accepted by the spirit the Initiation of the
Nadir cannot take place. Malkuth is the gate, the door to evolution and the work of
destiny. Evolution cannot take place until Involution is complete.*

*Gareth Knight, A Practical Guide to Qabalistic Symbolism (two volumes under one cover. York Beach,
ME: Samuel Weiser, Inc., 1965, 1978; ISBN 0-87728-397-4), Volume II, On the Paths and the
Tarot, pp. 9-10. Each volume has its own pagination, so the reader who would like to see the full text
containing the above must be careful to look for it in Volume II rather than Volume I, whose
pagination is distinct from that of Volume II.
 I differ very strongly from Knight’s assessment of psychospiritual pathology. The roots of
psychopathology are complex, and not always immediately evident. Some have their origin in
prenatal maldevelopment of the neuroendocrine system, or in some sort of injury to that system from
other causes. Others are linked to egregious chronic trauma, inflicted on the suffer when he or she is
very vulnerable, say, in childhood, or war, or as a political prisoner, or otherwise unable to avoid or
otherwise ward off such trauma. One could fob off the root cause on “past-life sins” or some such,
but that gets into a far great sin: the cultivation of the habit of blaming the victim. It is also not
subject to objective test, whereas there are ways to objectively test for possible causes of this or that
pathological condition operating entirely in the victim’s current life, and until those are eliminated as
possible reasons for such pathologies, “past-life sins” should never be invoked as a cause of them.

*****
One of the marks of a mentally and spiritually healthy human being is the ability to face chaos or
disorder and stick with it; resisting the temptation to escape into apathy, grief, anger, facetiousness,
intellectualizing, sanctimony, false mysticism, or any other of the myriad methods of running away from
reality. The Initiation of the Nadir is the ability to face things as they are, to accept oneself and one’s own
sins and distortions, as well as accepting others and their sins and distortions, realizing that the way each
has come is the way each has come, and that mutual recriminations or flattering falsifications will not
help matters whatsoever.
This attitude has been put forward by writers such as Nietzsche and Whitman amongst others,
together with a certain amount of varying personal distortion, and it has of recent years even become
something of an intellectual catchword – Acceptance. This is laudable in its way but the acceptance has
to be a complete and true one, (an attitude of the whole being, not a posture of the mind), for the Initiation
to be a real one.
. . . [One] must be willing to face, and go through with, one’s own Crucifixion before the subsequent
Resurrection and Ascension can be achieved – and all without fear or attempts to propitiate one’s own
particular Herod, Pilate, Caiphas, or mob – objective or subjective.
The symbols attributed to the 32 nd Path confirm this process. The Key to this path is the letter Tau,
meaning a Cross. The Cross is not only the Cross of Calvary but the Equal-Armed Cross and the Tau
Cross. The simple cross of equal arms is the Point, a symbol of Spirit and Light, extended in four
directions - – Light in Extension. It is also the Cross of the Elements, the Elements being a reflection in
Malkuth of the Four Holy Living Creatures in Kether which appear at the corners of the Tarot Trump of
the Universe.* This card is called The Great One of the Night of Time and one of the contacts of this
Path is the contact with the Great One, who can be considered Godhead Itself. The small fragment of
God-consciousness assigned to each man is the Holy Guardian Angel, the Knowledge and Conversation of
which is the Spiritual Experience of Malkuth.

*These are the Cherubim, which surround and shield the Throne of the Most High (God in Kether). They
symbolize the four Aspects of the Moon: Waxing ×, Full O, Waning ñ, and New ð. Astrologically
they correspond to the four Cherubic (Fixed) Signs: Taurus, the Bull, mid-Spring; Leo, the Lion,
mid-Summer; Scorpio, the Scorpion, mid-Autumn; and Aquarius, the Man, mid-Winter.

The Tau Cross is a three-armed cross, that is, a cross without the upper [portion of
the vertical] bar, and besides being the male or virile part of the Egyptian ankh, symbol
 of life, it also signifies two forces impacting on a higher level and producing a form on a
denser level. All form is built up of opposing higher forces locked together. The shape
of the letter Tau suggests the letter Resh, meaning a head, but with a downward
extension, ending with a virile Yod. Thus it can signify the Spirit or Head, (a Kether
symbol), sending its force downward into densest manifestation. The downward
projection could also be likened to an inverted letter Vau, meaning a Nail. This
suggests the Spirit nailed to the Cross of Matter to put it in rather grim terms, but terms
which serve to show the parallel between Cosmic and Christian symbolism. Being
upside down, as the Vau is, is a symbol of sacrifice or reflection – exemplified for
example in the Tarot Trump of the Hanged man – and it is also visual representation of
the Hermetic axiom ‘As above, so below.’

*Anent which it might be appropriate here to mention that Saturn, the Lord of this Path, also rules
history. History as we have lived it is the mundane reflection of processes on the Inner Planes and the
Will of the Gods. “As above, so below” – historically speaking, the crosses upon which Jesus of
Nazareth and so many others were crucified by the Romans was almost certainly in the form of a Tau
cross rather than either the cross represented on traditional Christian crucifixes, with four arms, the
uppermost of which is of shorter length than the lowermost one, or the equal-armed cross.

The astrological sign [sic; actually, it’s a planet] of the Path is Saturn, a sign [i.e.,
symbol or sigil, in the sense in which Knight uses the term here; obviously, he doesn’t
mean by it “astrological sign,” which is a Solar month!] composed of the Cross and the
Moon, and thus apt for the linking of Malkuth and Yesod. Saturn is considered to be
the planet of restriction and limitation and therefore implies Form. It is also a planet of
Supernal contacts however and so, as with Malkuth, there is an intimate connection
between this Path and the Sephirah Binah, the Mother of Form.
The Sickle is also a symbol of Saturn, as implied by the shape of the astrological
sign [i.e., symbol], and this was the weapon with which Cronos (Time)** castrated his
father Uranus (Space). 57 Here again in symbolic guise is the limitation and constriction
of Spirit into Time and Form. The sickle is also the reaping instrument, recalling the
wheat and grain Mysteries.

*Many scholars believe that the equation of Cronos, Saturn, with Chronos, Time, was either a Greek pun
or a Classical confusion of etymology. However, see Clube and Napier, op. cit., pp. 57, 58, 65, 66,
170, 186.

The fact that one’s final journey up the 32 nd Path will be in the processes of physical
death is emphasized in the fact that the popular figure of Death is a skeleton holding a
reaping hood [sickle].58 Father Time is another popular figure similarly equipped.* 59

*For some outstanding parables concerning Death and Time, see the marvelous Discworld novels of Terry
Pratchett such as, e.g., Reaper Man (New York: ROC/Penguin Books, 1991), Mort (Signet/NAL
Books, 1987), Soul Music (New York: Harper/Prism, 1995), Equal Rites (New York: Signet/NAL,
1987), etc.
 The Tarot Trump of the Universe shows a maiden dancing within a framing wreath,
usually holding a rod in each hand, . . . images of the Four Holy Living Creatures at the
corners of the card. There is a scarf about the maiden in the shape of a letter Kaph [Key
21, Trump X, Fortune], said to conceal the fact that she has male genitals and is thus
really hermaphroditic. Traditionally . . . Kaph means the palm of the Hand, which
according to cheiromancers reveals character as well as past and future. . . .
The figure on Trump XXI can be considered to be a symbol of the soul, as feminine,
or the Spirit, as androgynous. The Androgyne can be referred to the Machinery of the
Universe of Yesod. The rods, often spirals, may be either the positive and negative
modes of force which make up manifestation of the principles of involution and
evolution. In brief, the card may be said to represent the Spirit, taken on form, in the
frame of the manifest Universe. In Eastern terms, Shiva dancing.
The Yetsiratic Text of the 32 nd Path, which describes it as the Administrative
Intelligence, indicates that the Spirit should be in control of the whole of the seven
vehicles of man, represented by the planets. In etheric and physical terms these have
their analogues in the Chakras and the endocrine glands. 60

The Saturn/Binah symbolism of this path relates closely to the Divine Mother, the
Feminine-Side of God, which in pre-Christian times was the vehicle for worship of the
Second or Love Aspect of the Deity, now known more generally as the Second Person of
the Trinity, the Son. The full descent of the Spirit into Matter is exemplified by the
Crucifixion, the Beautiful Naked Man of Yesod on the Tau or Cross of the 32 nd Path.
The Path represents therefore the first stages of Devotional Mysticism as well as a Way-
in to the inner planes and the unconscious mind. Its main lessons are, ascending, the
existence of the causality of things on a higher or deeper level than the physical world;
and descending, the acceptance of densest Form limitation by the Spirit. . . . 61

The astronomy and physical reality of Saturn

All of the higher-octave Planets exhibit strikingly unusual physical characteristics which weren’t
discovered until, the invention of the telescope. Saturn’s beautiful, elaborate system of rings is a perfect
example of this, though, as we have learned from the Voyager space-probes in the last few years, among
Sol’s Planets it is by no means unique in this respect. It is, however, the brightest, most well-defined of
all the systems of rings possessed by any of the Planets, and it was the first such to be discovered.
Interestingly, this system of rings also suggests Saturn’s astrological influence, which is to give form,
manifest, crystallize, discipline, and restrict. This influence was recognized long before the telescope or
anything like it was known to human civilization; so this conformity of action and appearance in the case
of Saturn did not come about as a result of fitting esoteric concept to physical fact. In fact, as we have
learned from both ground-based telescopic observation and our modern space-faring robot probes, and as
we shall see in the case of the other higher-octave Planets, discussed in following chapters, in the case of
every one of the higher octave Planets, from Saturn outward, the physical reality of the Planet strongly
mirrors its esoteric influence. This strongly suggests that the Inner, Magickal, esoteric Planes are part of
the same overall Reality to which the objective, exoteric, physical universe belongs, so that there are
ultimate, fundamental principles underlying and determining the behavior and substance of all things,
whether esoteric and Magickal or exoteric and mundane.*

*In fact, it wouldn’t make sense if the case were otherwise. Our psychospiritual nature must work in
cooperation with our bodies to meet our needs in the context of whatever environments we live in.
Otherwise we couldn’t survive. So our psychospiritual nature has co-evolved with our physical
nature, in exactly the same way that various species of organisms sharing a habitat over long periods
of time co-evolve with one another, each evolving in form and behavior to take advantage of
opportunities and avoid risks presented by the results of the evolution of its neighbors and the habitat
 itself. The laws that govern both aspects of biological being, the psychospiritual and the physical
aspects of all living things, must be fundamental similar, complimenting each other when they are
not identical. Otherwise neither we nor any other form of life could function well in our bodies,
certainly not well enough to be successful at surviving and passing on our genes. Qaballistically, the
four major aspects of being – spirit or Will (the Fiery part); Creativity and responsiveness to
environment and others, the psyche (the Watery part); Intellect (the Airy part); and the body (the
Earthy part) – are considered to be aspects of one single underlying reality. Respectively these are
called Atziluth, the Archetypal World, associated with Kether; Briah, the Creative World, associated
with Chokmah and Binah; Yetzirah, the Formative World, associated with the complex of Sephiroth
including Chesed, Geburah, Tiphareth, Netzach, and Yesod; and Assiah, the Material World,
associated with Malkuth. None of these are considered to be any more real than any other; all are
part of the same universe, subject to the same underlying fundamental principles of being. The laws
of physical reality and those of psychospiritual reality are both derived from even more fundamental
principles that govern all that is, and the realms of mind, soul, and spirit are inseparable from those
of physical reality, however different at first their nature and denizens may appear to be.

That Saturn is the first of the Planets about which this was discovered is fitting. Saturn is known as
the Great Teacher, the Bringer of Wisdom, and it is His task to show us that the fundamental spiritual
rules of existence apply in all spheres of life, not only the “higher ones.” He is also the Lord of Matter
and Manifestation, hence the first Patron of all those who study the physical science and the laws of
physical existence, from physicists to Alchemists, and it is appropriate that it is from Him that we should
begin to learn that physical and spiritual reality are ultimately just different aspects of one unified
underlying reality.
Saturn was the most remote of the Planets known to the ancients, sixth in order of distance outward
from Sol. He was named in honor of the leader of the Titans, the first ruler of Olympus, father of
Zeus/Jupiter. Seen with the naked eye from Earth, Saturn is yellowish in color, and not particularly
attractive; but seen close up, through the instruments on board our space-probes, He is revealed to be
extraordinarily beautiful. At a medium distance, near Jupiter’s orbit, Saturn appears to be a rich gold in
color, reminding us that as Saturnus, the Roman name for Him, He was Lord of the Golden Age of
universal peace, plenty, brotherhood, and harmony. Still closer to Him, He shows gorgeous banding,
something like Jupiter’s, but differing in color from the ornate banding of the Giant Planet, and rather
more delicate than the latter’s almost vulgarly splendid decor. Intricate, lacy edge-effects along the
perimeters of His rings suggest the fascinating fractal structures which chaos science has discovered and
illustrated using computer-graphics software. Again, His physical appearance mirrors His esoteric
influences; He is diurnally exalted in Libra, which rules beauty and the fine arts and whose traditional
and diurnal mundane Lord is Venus, Goddess of Beauty. Curiously, Saturn’s compelling beauty was only
discovered through the products of modern science and high-energy technology, ruled by Aquarius, over
which Saturn is the nocturnal mundane Lord.
We now know Saturn’s basic physical characteristics at least as well as those of any of the Inner
Planets, thanks to space-probes such as Voyager. Saturn orbits Sol at an average distance of 1.4 x 10 9 km,
and has an appreciably eccentric orbit. At perihelion, He is 2.347 x 10 9 km from Sol; at aphelion, He
retreats to some 1.507 x 109 km away from Sol. It takes Him about 29.46 Earth years to orbit Sol.
Saturn is extremely massive, having a mass of 5.684 x 10 26 kg, some 95 times that of Earth and more
than that of any other Planet in the Solar System save Jupiter. Even so, He is the least dense of the
Planets, His density being about 70% that of water, since His equatorial diameter is 1.2 x 10 5 km and His
total volume is only 752 times that of Earth, far less than that of Jupiter and far too small to give Him an
appreciable density. In fact, if there were an ocean of liquid water big enough to put Him in, He would
float on its surface!
Saturn’s surface-gravity is only 1.19 times that of Earth. His escape velocity is 35.6 km/s, much less
than mighty Jupiter’s 59.6 km/s.
He has an axial inclination of 26.7 degrees from the vertical, slightly more than that of Earth and
Mars, and thus has definite Seasons. His albedo is 33%, so that He is a relatively bright object, in spite of
His great distance from Sol. Though He is much dimmer than Venus, Mars or Jupiter, even so, at His
most brilliant, He outshines most Stars, his magnitude then being -0.3, dimmer only than Sirius and
Canopus among the Fixed Stars. His magnitude is affected by the angle of presentation of His rings,
which are more reflective than the body of the Planet per se; when they are edge-on, as viewed from
Earth, even when He is closest to us He never has an apparent magnitude greater than +0.8.
 Like Jupiter, He rotates rapidly on His axis. The rotation period at His equator (System I) is 10 hr 15
min; at higher latitudes (System II), it is 10 hr 38 min; and at still higher latitudes (System III), as
determined from radio signals emitted by Him, it is 10 hr 39.4 min. Again, as with Jupiter, because of
Saturn’s liquid nature, various definite features on His surface have rotation periods of their own, so that
they drift about with respect to their longitude on His surface. Well-marked spots observable from Earth
anything like Jupiter’s Great Red Spot are rather rare, however.
As previously mentioned, Saturn has a magnetic field. This field is rather strong, as determined by
the Pioneer and Voyager probes. It is believed that the source of such Planetary electromagnetic fields are
conducting fluids at or near Their cores, but we have no idea yet what the chemical and physical
composition of Saturn’s core might be. We do know that the chemical composition of His surface, which
consists entirely of clouds, is markedly different from that of Jupiter. For one thing, relative to that of
Jupiter, Saturn’s surface contains far less helium. But in other respects He does resemble Jupiter. For
example, both of these giant Planets seem to consist almost entirely of the light elements helium and
hydrogen, in various proportions. In this They are nothing like the terrestrial Planets, Mercury, Venus,
Earth and Mars, Who have mean densities something like five times that of water. Also like Jupiter,
Saturn is a natural radio emitter, though not nearly as strong as Jupiter in this respect. Both Planets also
contain internal heat-sources, emitting about 1.6 times as much energy as They would if They depended
entirely upon what They received from Sol as the source of Their heat.
Be that as it may, Saturn’s magnetic field is unique in one respect: its magnetic axis corresponds
almost exactly to Saturn’s axis of rotation. The angle between the two axes is less than 1 degree, much
less than for any other Planet in the Solar System (at least, as far as we know; we have yet to learn what, if
any, magnetic field Pluto possesses, and what its characteristics may be). The center of this field is
displaced Northward about 2,400 km along its axis. Interestingly, the close correspondence between
Saturn’s rotational and magnetic axes is another hint on the physical plane of His nature. Saturn is strong
in the natal charts of those who have talent for careful precision work, particularly the fussy kind that
requires an almost obsessively perfectionist bent for its successful completion. The alignment between
Saturn’s two axes, the magnetic and the rotational, seems to say (perhaps with a haughty sniff): Now
here is an example of True Cosmic Craftsmanship – less than 1’ deviation between these two Poles of
Being!
Saturn has three main rings, two of them quite bright and readily visible even through early
telescopes. Together these three rings measure about 275,000 km in width. New rings have since been
discovered using the space-probes. They probably consist of pieces of water ice – in effect, these rings are
constructed of countless, swarming, giant snow-balls.
Like Jupiter and Uranus, Saturn possesses a system of regular satellites, bodies with nearly circular
orbits in the equatorial plane of Their Primary. But Saturn’s system of Moons has many differences from
those of these other two Planets. Jupiter has four major Moons and over a dozen small ones, and Uranus
has five known Moons, all between 550 and 1,800 km in diameter. Saturn’s system of Moons, however,
is dominated by one Moon of relatively enormous size, Titan, Who is larger than any other known
satellite in the Solar System save for Jupiter’s Moon Ganymede and Neptune’s gigantic Triton. All the
rest of Saturn’s Moons are much smaller than Titan.
Saturn has over 21 known satellites, possibly 23, more than any other Planet in the Solar System.
Those of His Moons that have names were named after Titans or Their brothers, the Giants, Who revolted
against Olympus in outrage against Zeus’s banishment of the Titans after the Olympians won Their war
against the Titans. Thus Rhea, a Titaness, for whom one of Saturn’s Moons is named, was the wife of
Kronos and the mother of the Olympians, and with Kronos ruled over the Planet Saturn. Iapetus, another
of His Moons, was named for the father of the Titan Prometheus, the creator of mankind, He who gave
the gift of fire to humanity. Mimas and Enceladus were named after Giants. Tethys and Hyperion were
named for a Titaness and Titan Who were Powers ruling over the Sun before the advent of the Olympians
and Their rule. Dione was named after the Titaness Who ruled over Venus at that time. Phoebe was
named for She Who ruled over Earth’s Moon.
These satellites are not all of the same general type. While all of them contain a large amount of ice
in Their physical makeup, otherwise there are great dissimilarities among them. Dione, with a diameter
of 1,120 km, is far denser than Tethys, though the latter is close in size to Dione, having a diameter of
1050 km. Mimas has one enormous crater, the diameter of which is about a third that of the satellite
itself. Part of the surface of Enceladus is almost as smooth as the proverbial billiard ball, taking into
account relative size. Hyperion’s shape is highly irregular. One side of Iapetus is bright, the other dark.
Phoebe is retrograde in motion; that Moon may originally have been an asteroid, captured by Saturn’s
immense gravitational field.
 The more recently discovered satellites have regular orbits, but the dynamic features of their orbits are
unusual. They are either “shepherds” of Saturn’s rings, helping to keep the edges of the rings crisp and
sharp; or They share the orbits of others of Saturn’s satellites in a Trojan relationship.* Of the named,
classic satellites, some of Their orbits have significant inclinations from Saturn’s equatorial plane;
Iapetus, for example, has an orbital inclination of about 14 degrees, while Phoebe’s is a staggering 150°.

*Two or more bodies are said to have a Trojan relationship when both occupy the same orbit around some
primary body, and in addition are stationed in that orbit such that they occupy the points of a regular
polygon inscribed within it. Usually there are two or three such bodies sharing an orbit in any such
relationship, stationed at the apices of an equilateral triangle, 120° apart.

Of Saturn’s named Moons, Mimas, Enceladus, Tethys, Dione, Rhea, Hyperion, Iapetus, and Phoebe
are much smaller than Luna or Jupiter’s large Moons, but they are still larger than most asteroids, Mars’s
tiny Moons, Jupiter’s small Moons, and the recently discovered, unnamed Moons of Saturn. Titan, the
largest of all Saturn’s satellites, has a diameter of 5,150 km. It also possesses an atmosphere of
significant depth and mass, composed primarily of nitrogen. It is a respectable Planet in its own right,
save for the fact that It orbits Saturn.
Saturn’s Moons, representing the pre-Olympian pantheon of the Titans and Their siblings, the
Giants, Gaia’s other children, are almost a Solar System in miniature, with Saturn as Their primary. If
the Planets are the Thrones of the Gods, Their Moons are the dwelling-places of all Their attendants,
consorts, lesser kin and other cohorts. Someday, perhaps, astrology and Magick will extend their scope to
the study and invocation of the Spirits of these Moons. Toward that day, careful study of the physical
characteristics and chemical makeup of the many Moons of Sol’s Planets is an investment worth making.
“As above, so below” applies to physical astronomy in its relation to the esoteric sciences perhaps more
than any other of the mundane disciplines. The nature of the Gods is made evident in Their Planetary
avatars. Study of those avatars through the science of astronomy is thus one of the greatest and best keys
to accomplishment of the Great Work, and this is as true for the Solar System’s Moons as It is of the
Planets Themselves. Traditionally, Saturn is the Planetary ruler of astronomy as well as of astrology; in
light of what we have learned in the last few decades about His rings and His system of Moons, this seems
to be absolutely fitting. 109

It is Saturn Who finally brings into material, concrete manifestation that which is initiated on the Inner
Planes as the Magickal expression of the Will and the Idea. Now, with such manifestation comes all the
ills to which Earthly Life is heir: aging, restriction, death, entropy in every form. Saturn perfects what
Uranus begins; but His way of perfecting things does not necessarily take our desires and needs into
account. Descriptive keywords for Saturn therefore include, e.g., the Taskmaster, the Tester, the
Adversary, the Grim Reaper, Death, Father Time, the Reality Principle, Crystallization, Form, Structure,
Obstruction, and Restriction. The mythology and astrology of Saturn are summarized rather neatly by this
list, as we will see. The Greeks called Saturn Kronos. Because His name is a homophone for Chronos,
the Greek word that means “time,” Saturn is identified with “time,” and is the Lord of Time. As we have
already seen, Kronos, one of the Titans, was the son of Ouranos, a despot and tyrant who ruled over
Heaven as His father Ouranos had before Him, and as His son Zeus did after Him. With the help of His
Mother, castrated and overthrew His father, Ouranos, Lord of the Sky, and then assumed the throne of
Heaven and Earth. Later, He was told by a seer that He would in turn be overthrown by one of His own
children. Frightened by this prophecy, to prevent this from occurring He swallowed each of His children
as They born – with one exception. This was His son Zeus, Whose mother, Rhea, successfully concealed
Zeus’s birth and hid Him away from His father by a ruse: She arranged to have Him raised safely far
away from His father, Who did not learn of Zeus’s existence until it was too late to do anything about it.
Zeus later returned from exile, forced Kronos to disgorge the rest of His brothers and sisters, dethroned
Kronos, and sent Him into exile. Zeus then became the King of the Gods.
The Romans, however, remembered Saturn as Saturnus, Lord of the Golden Age, a time when all
men and women lived in plenty and abundance, and shared all they had in common, without any jealousy,
envy, or strife among themselves. Saturnus was Lord of that age, and the Romans remembered Him with
wistful affection. As Aleister Crowley says:
 The eldest born son of Uranus was Saturn. Saturn is, in the first place, the patron of
agriculture, and also the God of generation. The age of Saturn was the ‘golden age.’ At
the time virtue thrived –- men were industrious, simple, austere and yet happy, but
Saturn also represented time, and it was said of him that he devoured his own children.
For this reason he was associated with . . . death. In the collapse of ancient civilization,
when life was no longer understood in its right relation to existence, when the worship
of Attis, Adonis, Osiris and other mutilated or murdered Gods became general, Saturn
became confused with the Jewish Shaitan. Time, life, and all the conditions of existence
were regarded as evil, as the result of malevolence. ‘Other-worldliness’ had destroyed
the simple acceptation [sic] of the facts of life which characterized paganism. The later
conception of Saturn is, therefore, principally that of heaviness, weariness and age, of
ill-will to men, and of peace upon earth, only the peace of the grave. . ..110

Saturn thus partakes of two natures: the cruel, despotic Titan tyrant, Who castrated and murdered
His own father and tried to do sway with His children; and the good, wise ruler of Earth, under Whose
rule all men and women prospered and lived in peace and plenty. The influence of Saturn thus benefits us
when we live in harmony with the laws of Nature and the Spirit, but punishes us cruelly when we break
those laws. Unfortunately, since Saturn also rules Time, sometimes this punishment is so long-delayed,
and so magnified by positive feedback when it finally does come, that it is often all out of proportion to,
and not in kind with, the infraction for which it is visited upon us. As a result, it is therefore not
recognized by us for what it is because it does not properly mirror the nature of that sin, the memory of
which has long since been buried by the intervening interval of time And experience. So Saturn has come
to be associated both with Satan, Lord of Evil, and Saturnus, the Lord of the Golden Age, when life was
all blessing, without sin, evil, and want. (It is the influence of Uranus, Neptune and Pluto to correct for
such misfirings of the influence of Saturn. Their effects upon our lives thus allow us to grow out of
infantile patterns of sadomasochistic excess, confusion between cause and effect, and misunderstandings
concerning the reasons for punishment and the question of its applicability, as will be discussed in the
following chapters of this part of Volume 2.)
Thus one the one hand, Saturn is associated with restrictions and frustrations of all kinds, with pain,
want, privation, punishment, cruelty, and every sort of oppression. In this aspect, He is the apotheosis of
the despot and of all pathologies of power, particularly those of long duration. But on the other hand, He
is also regarded as the Teacher of Wisdom, the archetype of the protective grandparent and elder of the
community who teaches, watches over and provides for the long-range future of all the children of the
community. In either case, He is associated with age and all it brings, both its benefits and its pathologies,
as well as with all that endures, and the qualities that make anything or anyone long-lived. On the positive
side, because of the foregoing, He is associated with the wisdom, self-discipline and intelligent concern for
the future of those who live to a healthy and prosperous old age, raising families which in turn are
prosperous and vital. Negatively, He represents the tyranny of the insecure elderly, senility, breakdown of
materials due to aging, physical Illnesses and injuries due to senescence, and so forth.
Saturn is the outermost of the Planets known to classical and pre-modern Europe. He is thus the
guardian of the outer frontiers of the known and “normal,” and by implication He hints at the existence of
the unknown, the alien, the strange. This is the reason that Saturn rules all tendencies toward
conservatism, resistance to change, and neophobia, fear of the new and unknown: in the same way that
He once served to block European man’s awareness of the cosmic realms beyond His orbit and their
potentials for Magickal exploitation, within the psyche He functions as the preconscious, the barrier
between the conscious mind and the unconscious, the censor that decides what we are to be aware of and
what not.
The frontier which He represents is not only one of space – it bounds time, as well. Significantly, it
was only after the telescopic discovery by Europeans of Uranus that the great breakthroughs in our
understanding of the sheer vastness of the size and age of the universe, the age of the Solar System and of
our own Planet within it, and the enormous span of time encompassing our own natural evolution from
Life’s beginnings on Earth, took place. Uranus’s discovery was like a vision cried out to the world by
some wild, alien prophet of the stunning scientific discoveries and paradigm shifts that were to take place
in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in Europe and America. These included the revolution In
biology, and in particular in human biology, that began in 1868 with the publication of Charles Darwin’s
Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection: or the Preservation of Favoured Species in the
Struggle for Life; the revolution in physics that began with the publication of Albert Einstein’s Special
and General Theories of Relativity in 1906; the revolution in information-processing that began in the
1940s with the creation of the world’s first electronic computers; and the simultaneous revolutions in
politics, technology, morality and global ecological awareness that began so ominously on the morning of
August 6, 1945, in Hiroshima, Japan, when a nuclear bomb obliterated that city, along with 100,000 of its
people, in one incandescent instant of horror.
Saturn blinded us to these possibilities before Uranus’s discoveries – and protected us from the
horrors which were loosed from that Pandora’s box of modern scientific and technology discovery opened
so suddenly and unexpectedly by the Uranian currents of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Oppressive tyrant and anxious guardian, He stood at the ends of the known universe throughout the
classical period of European scientific understanding, subjecting Europe to the leaden tyrannies of Church
and State even as He prevented European man from getting his hands on the explosive knowledge which
would ultimately either give us the Stars or burn up our whole world, and us with it.
Richard Grossinger says of Saturn:

Saturn stood at the end of the old Solar System, an aged king with a long white
beard. Beyond him was nothing. He was organization, completion, age – the final and
frozen arrangement of things. Even as revolution and radical and unconscious actions
change things, Saturn still stands as a great rock fortress, within custom, within society,
within matter, and within mind, holding to the original and eternal truths. The strength
of the Saturnian gesture is overwhelming, but its invocatory images may be fleeting and
misleading, like the election of Ronald Reagan. There is a coldness and sadness to
Saturn because it is eternal, hopeless, and unremitting. In electing a Saturnian, we, in a
sense, turn to and acknowledge our own inner darkness. Even the later Galilean rings fit
the sepulcher image: Saturn is a ringed planet, the only one as seen from Earth. It is a
closed mysterious tomb. Something has died there, and the spot in the sky is marked in
such a way that the symbol could not have been missed by the earth’s first telescopes.
The finality of Saturn is both its virtue and its curse. Mythologically, Saturn is the
creator of time, which makes him a healer, a guardian, a shield. He protects the inner
Solar System from the infinite chaos. In the body, he both creates density and
disintegrates used materials, including the skeletal frame itself ultimately. His wisdom
is like the oldest Buddhist teachings – the wisdom of suffering. Because Saturn guards
time, he alone contains the wisdom outside of time. . . .
From Janus and Mimas [Saturn’s Moons], the incredible golden planet fills the
whole sky . . .. If the Gurdjiefian Moon steals souls, what must Saturn do to the poor
creatures in its system!. . .
Ringed Saturn is the passageway both into and out of the modern world. And it is
the gate in time to the ancient kingdoms of the Earth. Outside its orbit are only the
radical occult planets, discovered in modern times, which represent different cosmic
forces entirely.111

When all is said and done, Saturn represents the wisdom of the recognition of limits and the
consequences of ignoring or transcending them, which can be positive or negative, depending upon
circumstances. On the one hand, Saturn represents the prosperity and long-term happiness that are the
usual consequences of living wisely within one’s means, neither over-exploiting ones habitat nor, out of
fear or stupidity, making little of the possibilities it contains, like the foolish servant who hid his talent
rather than investing it (New Testament, Matthew 25: 14-30). This is the function of Saturnus, the wise
and beneficent Roman God of agriculture, the Roman equivalent of the Greek Kronos. In this aspect, He
represents ecological wisdom in its most practical and immediately applicable aspect: to live well is to
live in harmony with one’s body, one’s spirit, one’s neighbors, and the living world. This is Saturn’s
benign aspect, which He shows as long as the world is running pretty much as usual.*

*I.e., the long-term state of ecological and geomorphological equilibrium alternating with short-term,
generally infrequent, drastic change in the evolutionary rhythm which Stephen Jay Gould and his
colleagues call “punctuated equilibrium.” 112
 Of course, there is a dark side to this aspect of Saturn: as we are learning at horrifying cost, not only
to ourselves as individuals or even just to us as a species, but unfortunately to our poor home Planet as a
whole, when you make a habit of living beyond your ecological means, ignoring the ancient wisdom of
Life, wasting, polluting, and throwing away your biological and ecological capital like a damned soul in
the last hour before midnight, the consequences of such a spendthrift existence are both inevitable and
hideous. Medically, these consequences show up in the individual in such forms as vicious cancers, lethal
heart-disease, debilitating strokes and countless other horrors. Economically, their ultimate results are
manifest in the collapse of nations. In planetary terms, they can mean the extinction of a species – or of a
world. It is the task of Saturn to teach us to live intelligently within our ecological means, within the
ancient rhythms of Earth’s life, as responsible living parts of our Planet, integrated with the rest of Her
children.
But in His other aspect, as Kronos, Saturn becomes the Great Oppressor. It is in this aspect that He
sets up obstacles and barriers to necessary radical change, whether in socioeconomic mobility, physical
pioneering, expansion of scientific and esoteric awareness, or any other important dimension of our
psychospiritual life. It is in this aspect, for example, that He becomes the abusive and sadistic parent,
cruelly punishing a child for age-appropriate behavior. It is Kronos Who shapes and impels the psychotic
antics of a crazy dictator like Hitler, so determined to eliminate even the slightest taint of “Jewishness”
from the world that he bans “Jewish science” in any form – including the innovations in science and
technology which otherwise would have enabled him to win a World War and keep himself from being
ground down into the ruck and midden of history by the advance of the enemy’s forces, which have been
given their superior military edge by “Jewish-inspired” technological advances. When your house is
burning furiously and it is time to get the hell 0-U-T of there, it is Kronos Who tries to keep you inside it,
busily and “productively” sweeping the floor, washing the dishes and polishing the silverware. It is
Kronos Who keeps us “plowing the furrow in the straight and narrow,” oblivious to the fact that if we
continue to do so, we will strip the land bare of its cover and leave it wide open to erosion by rain and
wind.*

*That was the fate that befell much of the American Midwest in the 1920s and 1930s, when traditional
European-derived methods of cultivation and agricultural exploitation of the land raped the land of
all its protective natural botanical cover, planted it to vest, one-crop fields that were an open
invitation to plagues of “pests,” and triggered the formation of the catastrophic Dust Bowl that
destroyed the hopes of hundreds of thousands of farming families and their employees.

Kronos is a cruel parody of Saturnus. Saturnus teaches traditions by which men may live in
ecological, economic and personal sanity and harmony with themselves and the world, so that they and
their societies may be prosperous, healthy and happy. Kronos orders men to live according to the same
traditions by which their forefathers lived, regardless of circumstances or need: “What was good enough
for Grandpa is good enough for you!” – and too bad if it isn’t. Like all parodies, Kronos is not a true
reflection of Saturnus: whereas Saturnus has both bright and dark sides to His nature, the nature of
Kronos is only dark. Kronos doesn’t teach; instead, He orders, He demands. He does not share; He
takes . . . and takes, and takes, and takes, everything from our wealth to our hope, our dreams, and finally,
our lives. He teaches us to read horror into the inevitable, whether horror really is an inalienable pert of it
or not. Saturnus has an opposite pole, a partner, Who supplements His functions when Saturnus’ abilities
are exceeded: Uranus, bringer of the necessary and life-supporting New. Kronos has no partner, no true
opposite pole: He demands and orders, world without end, whether His demands and orders are
appropriate and life-supporting or not, and sadistically punishes those who will not or cannot meet His
demands, regardless of circumstances. In this aspect of Saturn, Uranus stands in relation to Him as a
liberating army to a psychotic despot whose oppressions threaten to destroy his own people. Kronos is
Saturnus gone life-threateningly psychoneurotic, living a life of eternal, bone-chilling horror, visiting that
horror on all around Him.
Certainly the ancient and classical patriarchal Greek religion rationalized and reinforced oppression
visited upon women and children in Greek society. But it was also, perhaps, a liberation from early
tyranny, represented by the Titan cult, which was overthrown by the followers of the Olympian religion.
Cultural institutions such as long-standing religions are rarefy displaced or destroyed solely through the
application of force majeur by an invading culture. The new, invading religion must finally be accepted
by the people. When it is not, as history shows us again and again, the old Gods rise again, or simply
never lose Their power.* For example, Kali, a Mother-Goddess of the ancient Draviddians of the Indian
sub-continent, was never displaced by the invading, conquering Aryans and their own pantheon of Gods
and Goddesses. Even attempts by the Aryans to demonize Kali finally failed, and they ultimately
incorporated Her into their own pantheon as an aspect of Durga, their own Mother-Goddess. Today Kali
is revered by millions of Hindus as Protector of the Poor and the Orphans, the St. Michael and St. George
of India.

*A fact which the Roman Catholic Church wisely exploited, by including in its hagiology the old pagan
Gods of the people of the Lands invaded by Western European Christianity, now dressed up as
Christian saints. This ploy, which allowed the people to worship both the old Gods and the new,
Christian ones (though the former had to take a reduced status relative to the latter), combined the
best of both theological realms and took the starch out of much of the resistance of the people to a
Christian takeover of their traditional, pagan cultures.

On the other hand, Kronos and the other Titans, the Gods displaced by the invading Hellenistic
culture and their Olympian religion, never recovered from Their defeat, as the surviving mythology
shows. Was this, perhaps, due to the fact that the invading Olympian cult, whatever new oppressions it
night have represented, also entailed significantly less oppression than the Titan cult and the culture it
represented? The question is very much worth investigating by both secular historians and esoteric
scholars; the answer may give us important clues both as to our historical evolution and manifold nature
of the sociobiological functions of Saturn for Western European humanity as well as for our Planet as a
whole.
Though Kronos represents the normal experience of Saturn’s activity in Western European-derived
cultures, He is basically a distortion or parody of Saturnus. The Latter is the healthy apotheosis of Saturn’s
influence on our Planet’s life, whereas Kronos represents everything that went wrong with Saturnus – or
the reaction of European humanity to Him – several thousand years ago. If we and our living world are to
survive into the next few centuries on any sort of viable basis, we will have to learn Saturn’s essential
nature, and live in a healthy relation to it. To do so, we must find out how the pathology that is Kronos
came into existence; for in that is the beginning of European humanity’s disjuncture with the living
world, which finally today has culminated into Planet-wide ecological disaster that threatens to destroy all
Earth’s life, ourselves included.
Uranus represents the cutting edge of the growth of our scientific, technological and esoteric
knowledge. But it is in Saturn, and our response to Him, that the understanding of all the wrong turnings
of our past is to be found: He is, after all, the intelligence behind “de greasy fingers dat wields de cutting
edge” (not to mention the one which sharpens it!), and it is the wisdom which He provides that enables us
to employ that same cutting edge for ourselves with any effectiveness, efficiency, precision or grace. If the
new knowledge provided by Uranus is to profit us at all, it can only be so if we have gained wisdom from
our past. Truly, “he who does not study the lessons of history – is forced to repeat them.” If we do not
want to keep repeating and repeating the disastrous ecological and psychospiritual stupidities which
already have very nearly put paid to Life’s grand experiment on Earth until we finally do for ourselves
and all our non-human neighbors with which we share our world, then we had better undergo a major
paradigm shift concerning Saturn, and investigate His nature anew, esoterically as well as on the physical
plane, this time with a reverence born of our 11 th-hour awakening to ecological and Planetary wisdom.
For it is here, in the bosom of the Ancient One, Lord of the Outer Cold of classical Europe, the Beautiful
Golden One so startlingly revealed to us in the late 20th century by our fly-by space-probes, that the key to
our future – and that of all Earth’s life – rests concealed by all our self-serving, ecologically idiotic
mystifications and rationalizations. Saturn is, after is, one of Horus’ Planetary avatars – not to mention
that of Maat, Who is to rule the Aeon to follow, the Aeon of Capricorn. Magickally and psychologically,
He is thus a harbinger of the New Aeon every bit as much as Uranus is, and a complete understanding of
the potentials of that New Aeon depends upon an equally complete understanding of Saturn – which, up
until now, We have neither sought nor attained.

Nota bene:
 In The Morning of the Magicians,* Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier have this to say about Saturn:

The old alchemic texts affirm that the keys to the secrets of matter are to be found
in Saturn. By a strange coincidence, everything we know today in nuclear physics is
based on a definition of the ‘Saturnian’ atom. According to Nagasoka and Rutherford,
the atom is ‘a central mass exercising an attraction surrounded by rings of revolving
electrons.’*

The current model of the atom is that of a central region made up of particles of neutral matter
(neutrons) and positively-charged particles (protons), surrounded by an electronic “cloud” or set of
orbitals (regions of probable positions) of negatively-charged sub-atomic particles. The electrically
neutral and positive particles in the central region, like the electrons surrounding them, are in turn
composed of still smaller particles, and so on, perhaps to infinity (infinitesimality?). Ultimately,
according to quantum physics, there is no such thing as “solid matter”; there are only infinitely
complicated fields or patterns within still other fields, within still other fields – viewpoints, if you will,
stacked on top of viewpoints in every possible sort of arrangement. Matter is just mind restricting itself to
pattern; energy is just mind moving from pattern to pattern. Or so it seems. If this is truly how physical
reality is put together, then the Bohr atom described in the paragraph above is a completely obsolete
model of reality, one that doesn’t do justice to things as they actually are. And that does seem to be the
case. Pauwels and Bergier seem to have dropped a stitch – or perhaps, as a sterling example of the “Sin of
Da’ath,” that of mistaking mere knowledge (Da’ath as Saturn) for true understanding (Binah, Uranus)
and understanding for true wisdom (Chokmah, Neptune), missed the point.
To the true Alchemist, Saturn represents time, and the wisdom it brings, as well as the patience one
must practice to learn wisdom. Alchemical operations are frequently carried out over long periods of
time, and require virtually infinite patience on the part of the Alchemist for the hope of their success.
Impatience has been the ruin of many an Alchemical experiment – or even of the Alchemist him- or
herself, since ruin of Alchemical experiments is often equivalent to a ghastly explosion that maims or
even kills anyone in the vicinity, as well as destroying the structure in which it is carried out. Success –
and survival – in Alchemy involves time, great stretches of it, in which nothing and nothing and nothing
seems to happen but endlessly repeated, utterly tedious operations apparently with no results. But if
everything is done in the proper order and sequence, over the correct amount of time, the timing of the
beginning of every operation dictated by the proper astrological configurations, then success is virtually
certain.
It all depends on time: time, as in the great lengths of time necessary for completion of an
Alchemical procedure; time, as in the timing of operations according to considerations, the science of
time and timing, traditionally ruled by Saturn as Lord of Aquarius.
Elsewhere in The Morning of the Magicians, the authors quote the Alchemist P’ere Castel (1728),
who said:

I have said that if one took away the Earth’s gravity one would take away light at
the same time. For indeed, light and sound and all other qualities perceptible to our
senses proceed from, and are, as it were, a result of the mechanical structure, and
consequently the gravity of natural bodies which are luminous or sonorous in proportion
to their degree of gravity and buoyancy.’

Ibid., p. 68

Or, as Einstein showed, light or energy and gravity are two aspects of the same, underlying reality. And
time is a corollary of energy, for energy is change, and change is only perceptible in terms of time.
It is Saturn Who rules gravity, as He rules time. Gravity is inextricably connected to mass, and to
matter, which is just energy neatly packaged in a relatively stable form for your convenience, sir and
madam. So Saturn is truly the key to matter, for He rules time, and thus energy, and therefore, as Einstein
also showed, matter.
*Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier, The Morning of the Magicians (New York: Scarborough
Books/Stein and Day, Publishers, 1977), p. 89.

On humor as our Saving Grace:

Jesus was a clown – the devil is a psychologist
by the Very Left Reverend Magistra Doktor Batrix,
Το Μικρον Θεριον DXCV (Marked Down from DCLXVI)
the Infra-Red Woman of the Church of the SubGenius,
Pope of altogether too much of the Broadview District of Seattle
and Greenwood Ave N

It is by means of our human communities, those great complex things that are half-machine, half-
dream, that we survive and carry on the torch of the generations. That which protects community, indeed,
the possibility of community, which inspires and generates it, lies at the heart of what it is to be human.
Saturn, the Protector, the first, most inward of the Outer Planets of the Collective, is the apotheosis of
humanity, and thus of community, as the preserver and nourisher of life. The following essay, on the
psychosocial and sociospiritual niche of the clown, concerns what may be Saturn’s least-understood
function, that of the shaman that is the clown, who defines and protects the outer bounds of human
community by means of comedy, satire, lampoon, and other forms of humor. By getting us all to laugh at
something, he or she also gets us all to laugh with one another, and thereby include one another in our
community. By inspiring solidarity through laughter, the clown thereby induces us to strive to cherish
and protect those with whom we share our laughter, and therefore ultimately the total community of life.
The title of this rant, children, is taken from something which that great and wise Yetinsyny, the anti-
psychiatrist Thomas Szasz, once wrote: “A psychologist is someone who, rather than laughing at a joke,
analyzes it.” It is laughter that is our true Saving Grace – and that which sets us off, not from the other
beings with which we share the Living Universe, but rather from ultimate evil, the End less Utter Darkness
of the Soul, that hates all that lives and participates in Life.
I happen to be a Ceremonial Magickian. In the course of my life, I’ve had to undergo a lot of tests,
learn a great deal of things – you see, to become a true Magus of Power, one must systematically recover
everything that has come together to create one in the first place – not just one’s individual lifespan, not
even just the history of one’s community and society and culture, but the natural his tory of one’s whole
species, indeed, that of the whole living world. And one has to do this not only intellectually, but on all
the Planes, especially those of real-life experience, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. For the hu-
man being, this means recovery of all of Homo faber, Man the Maker, of course – Tool-User, Tool-Maker,
Craftsman, Artisan, Engineer, all of it: Rich Man, Poor Man, Beggerman, Thief; Doctor, Lawyer, Indian
Chief! Remember the old rhyme? The Warrior, the Poet, the Beggar, the King, the Goodwife, the Child,
the Courtesan, the Prostitute, the Statesman, the Actor, the Charwoman, the Janitor and Garbage-
Collector and Handyman and Lion-Tamer and Nurseryman.
And the Fiend. Oh, yes, children – the Fiend.
I received what may have been the late and much missed cartoonist Chas Addams’ last great gift, at
least to me, from a dream this morning. In that dream, I saw the Exit from Club Vesta, this in terminably
long, drawn-out epic about an erotic Inferno I’ve been slowly exploring and taking notes on all these
months past. And lo, on the rock wall outside the Exit, low down, close to the place it met the path way
leading away, to the world of Life, was the old, familiar, beloved signature:

Chas Addams
As I had been discovering on my journey through Club Vesta, what a human being really is, is a -
community animal, an animal whose nature evolved as part and parcel of communities of his own kind,
whose survival and well-being, physically and spiritually, is dependent upon those of his community.
Human culture and human psychology have both been selected to try always, among other things, to do
what they can to preserve and cherish such community and keep the individual part of it. Someone once
defined Homo sapiens as “the animal who laughs.” I would amend that to “the animal who laughs as
part of a community of his own kind,” whose laughter is part of a vast, unbelievably rich and complex set
of collective survival strategies designed to help perpetuate and nurture the community upon which he is
dependent for the survival of his very soul, not just his body. In our laughter, we are far more than just
ourselves as individuals – when we laugh, for a short time we become our communities, including that
most vast of our communities, our living world, Gaia. In his masterpiece, A Canticle for Liebowitz
[1960], Walter M. Miller, Jr. had one of his characters in the second part of the book, an abbot, thinking
about what it is that makes us human and more than a little divine, that sets us off and helps protect us
from real evil. As he put it, thinking about the Feast of St. Maisie, it’s a matter of “laughing at the
hangman – no, laughing with the hangman, laughing at the Stultus Maximus,” at ultimate evil, as part of
human community, the latter including even the hangman. In our laughter, in even our sickest jokes –
indeed, especially in our very sickest jokes, our most-midnight black humor – we acknowledge, embrace
the whole human community for those moments of laughter. Orgasm unites us momentarily with the
individual beloved under the aegis of Eros – laughter units us for a little while the entire hu man
community, perhaps even the whole living world, under the aegis of the Living God, the God of All.
In vacuuo, that is, alone by ourselves, cut off from the sociospiritual universe of communion with
other human beings or just with other living beings of any kind, we are not human. No matter what defi-
nition of ourselves we come up with, it can’t define us accurately or completely unless it takes account of
the fact that our nature is inextricably bound up in community – not only the community of those with
whom we share a gene-pool, but indeed the whole living world. “Brother Sun, Sister Moon.” St. Francis
knew. Native peoples who regard non-human beings as people – they know, too. We are ultimately inte-
gral, inextricable parts on a psychospiritual as well as ecological level of the community that is the whole
living world. Our laughter reflects even that – why else do we find Gary Lar son, Chas Addams, Gahan
Wilson so hysterically funny? Even H. P. Lovecraft’s ghoul-friend Pickman and his companions, even
Gary Larson’s cows, Chas Addams’ night-creeps – they are all our close spiritual kin, aren’t they?
Laughter isn’t just a matter of laughing at – it is a matter of laughing with, of acknowledging who our true
kin are . . . and laughing at our affected pretensions that oh, no, we aren’t as them. Well, yes, we fucking
well are too as them, whoever the fuck they are, aren’t we, after all? Otherwise we couldn’t laugh as we
do at such outrageousness – whereas instead, we can’t not laugh!
I have been hunting all my life for community to be part of. I went through such hell on earth, such
psychospiritual horror as a toddler and small child, that no matter who I reached out to, nobody ever
understood, nobody could care. Not even survivors of Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Dachau, nobody
recognized me as part of their living community! <u>Nobody</u>. And so there never was any love. –
Except . . . except that I was raised by a cat. She loved me. A non-human being. She loved me dearly –
and she taught me what community is really all about!
Shall we talk about what goes on in experimental laboratories where they use cats as subjects? Or
dogs, or rabbits, or ferrets, or insects, for Wotan’s sake?! Or, shall we talk about what goes on in
slaughter-houses? Shall we talk, for that matter, the horrors that people who work in the City Morgue see
every day, that cops and firemen and paramedics and soldiers can’t avoid seeing, day in and day out,
because it’s part of their job? Graveyard humor. All of us, human and non-human alike, understand it –
and when we find ourselves laughing at it before we can think about it, instinctively, compulsively, for
that little while we know we are one with all others who likewise understand it, and laugh, that we are
ultimately, spiritually, on the inside looking out with the living world, with human beings, with whatever
community we share our laughter with . . . and that what we are looking out at is the horror we are
laughing at. We are, in laughter, expressing our joy at being warm and cozy inside the great beating
Heart of Life with our community – and that that, the horror we laugh at, is safely outside that Heart,
locked away where it can’t hurt us, locked away by the unbreakable bonds of love and shared
understanding that are Life’s great, eternal Community.
Damnation is being locked out of that heart, locked outside, in the Sitra Achra, forever . . . where all
the monsters are. A major indicator of true psychopathology is the inability to laugh at all. Those who do
not laugh, not at anything, we know instinctively are dead to the heart. Black depression is a taste of such
ultimate, utter damnation. We call those who are denied the blessings of laughter spiritless – for we know
that their spirits, their wills, their very souls have been utterly crushed, their last psychospiritual ties to the
rest of us totally destroyed.
This is why, as that all-time Master of Horror, Stephen King, has pointed out, horror and laughter lie
so close together, why it is that when we confront and feel horror, laughter is never very far away:
because the literature and cinema of horror are jokes, acknowledgment of common membership in the
same community, just as laughter is. When we are feel the horror which an author or producer is trying
to evoke in us with his or her creation, we can only do so because we are part of the same community he
or she is – and the fact that we feel the horror, like the fact that we feel the laughter the comedian or
story-teller is striving to call forth in us, is realization that we are part of that community. Otherwise that
common understanding and reaction couldn’t be possible. Horror, like laughter, is a matter of laughing at
the Stultus Maximus, sharing that laughter with the hang man and everyone else in our community, no
matter how low or kapu. The difference is – as long as horror isn’t transmuted into laughter, like the
erotic zombies trapped in Club Vesta, you are never sure whether you can ever go home again, whether
you’ll be able to get back Inside from the terrifying Cold Darkness here Outside that is the universe of
horror fiction. Tragedy concerns the stories of those poor bastards who find, at last, that no, they can’t go
home again, never, ever, that they will indeed remain trapped forever Outside in the Demonic Dark.
Comedy concerns the realization that yes, you can go home again – and the experience of doing so, in
laughter. It wasn’t for nothing that Dante called his three-part masterpiece The Divine Comedy!
Robert A. Heinlein hints at this in his breakthrough science-fiction novel Stranger in a Strange Land.
Charles Addams shows it. There are Addams cartoons – ones you and I would recognize instantly, with
which we have long been familiar – everywhere, even in huts in the midst of tropical jungles in South
America and Africa. His humor is universal – his humor of darkness, horror, agony. Whether prelate or
bishop or goodwife or prostitute or physician or witch-doctor, whoever we are, we look – and we laugh.
We can’t not laugh. It is always the same Feared Thing we see – and we laugh, and know that like
everyone else, we share that fear, and knowing that we do, we realize we are part of the whole world,
neighbors to everyone and everything, and that the Boogeyman is locked out there in the Cold forever
away from us, with us inside here in the Warm for all eternity. And in that blessed understanding we find
our redemption.
In our laughter we are redeemed. That is why the Church of the SubGenius is a true and real and
great religion: it addresses the heart and soul of what it is to be hu man, in a terrifying, dark, scary
universe full of alien weirdness and horrible peril, and shows us how to be whole and happy within it . . .
by making us laugh.
God bless the clowns. Jesus is our “Bob”!
Hence the paradox of the Grim Clown: those who have skated most closely to the bare, bitter
Razor’s-Edge of Things know best how to call forth our laughter, for they know most thoroughly what it
is to be human – from having had their humanity, their souls most horribly threatened. Concentration-
camp survivors, battered wives, battered children, cops, firemen, interns – they know best what makes us
laugh. They have to – that is their psychospiritual lifeline, that knowledge, perhaps all that keeps them
from falling free into the Big Dark Empty forever, screaming, screaming down into demonic damnation.
Laughter keeps them tied on a spiritual level to human community as nothing else could, not need to
make a living, not sex – nothing else.
There is, of course, laughter that doesn’t draw us into its warm, welcome orbit, the joke we don’t
share, can’t share: this is the joke of the one so far gone away from life’s communion, not merely human
community but that of the whole living world, that he or she no longer shares our fears, our joys, our
hopes, our desires, our terrors. This is the one who has embraced the Sitra Achra, the Other Side, the
universe so alien that it contains nothing of humanity, perhaps not even of Life itself. It is the world of
Josef Mengele, Jeff Dahmer, history’s great monsters, the ones to whom all the rest of us are at best no
better than stockyard resources, things to be used and thrown away, at worst pests to be exterminated – or
tortured to death for the sheer fun of it. For them, the joke is on Life itself – the joke is at Life and
everything that makes it worth living, indeed, even possible. Like all other human (including erstwhile)
beings, they, too, are part of some community: thus, they laugh. But with what? Of what community are
they part? That of the Sitra Achra, ultimate evil, that which hates Life, lives on its destruction, thrives on
the eternal spiraling downward into the ultimate Death of All.
– Oh, yes, children, I hear you say: We are not as them, we don’t take our joy in life-destroying evil,
we love, we embrace life, we are truly part of human community, we love “Bob” and “Bob” loves us, we
aren’t monsters, oh, no, not us. . . . Oh, yeah? So why the fuck are you sniggering right along with
Beavis and Butthead?
For you see, between the deadly Dark of the Sitra Achra and the warm, gold, sunny vistas of Life,
there is this vast gray area, the area of In Between. This is the place we find ourselves in when we
descend from all that God-like Agape and Common Humanity and Communal Oneness into mean-
spiritedness, sourness and twilight, in short, less than the sort of divine perfection we all aspire to and
would like to think we’ve achieved. Hah! Oh, sure we have! As long as we live, we are mortal, and
therefore less than perfect – and thus somewhere deep inside each of us there is a Beavis, yea, a Butthead,
a sniggering, snot-nosed, horrible sub-adolescent Inner Psychopath thing that goes Nyuck-snuck-snuck!
<i/> over utterly ghastly situations, that laughs at cripples, and pretty girls, and little children, that gets its
rocks off at traffic accidents and loves it when everything goes horribly Wrong and the circus tent goes up
in flames with all the clowns and children inside and the fire department doesn’t get there in time and
when it does get there, the fire-hydrants turn out to yield nothing but pure gasoline! Nyuck-snuck-snuck!
Oh, yes, children, Beavis liveth, Butthead liveth, they are also, yea and verily, you’d better believe it, part
of all we are – the nastiest part, I’ll give you, the part we are very right to be thoroughly ashamed of . . .
but still an inalienable part of us, forevermore.
The genius of Chas Addams was that he enabled us to laugh not only at good ol’ Beavis and
Butthead, but, simultaneously, with them, as well, to enable us, with a spasm of laughter, to accept even
those insufferably repellant parts of ourselves as part of us, to love even that in ourselves – and understand
that the Unmentionable Thing to Be Laughed At is outside and beyond even them, outside even that
slimy, nasty, unbearable, unspeakable Littleness within ourselves.
Ave morituri, Chas, thou great and good and wonderful clown – you gave us back to ourselves,
enabled us to love ourselves, as few others could. If Jesus was ever real, he was a clown – no one else
could have done what he was alleged to do! “Bob” be with you, now and forever more: without you and
all the other Dear and Glorious Physicians of our souls and spirits, Hell would have triumphed over us
long, long ago.
The true Magi of Power, as they have always been, are clowns, children. Like “Bob,” Jesus was a
clown. It is in laughter that we are ultimately saved – and those who kill laughter, who take out its warm,
beating heart and vivisect it to death, are the devil’s henchmen. Not even Nhee-Ghee turns on the very
thing that keeps life mended and whole in spite of everything that happens to rend it to pieces! Nhee-
Ghee is of Wotan, as “Bob” is of Wotan, Left Hand to “Bob”‘s Right – but the people who kill laughter,
who analyze it to death, to “study its psychology” in the way that an army’s general staff studies an enemy
general, in order to defeat it – these, these aren’t of our universe at all! They never knew “Bob” and
never can, are not even of the Conspiracy, which, in spite of its malignancy, has no intention of
destroying the world that sustains it, but rather of Ultimate Evil, the true destroyers of life and the world
and all that we hold dear!
So remember, children: Jesus was a clown. God bless the clowns – they are, at the last, all that stand
between us and the Great Awful Dark!

Nota bene:

By the same token, humor and laughter are also potential weapons. By getting others to laugh with
you and at someone else, you instantly define yourself as part of their community, and the one laughed at
as an outsider. They will thereby tend to sympathize and identify with you and your values and despise or
hate the other, because of a reflex so old that it may antedate the existence of Class Mammalia itself. This
is the function of “outsider” jokes, the butts of which include women, mothers-in-law, blacks, Hispanics,
gay men, lesbians, etc.: to create community at the expense of people from another group. Used
skillfully, the tailoring and deployment of such jokes among a selected population will lay that population
open to some form of exploitation by those using this form of disinformation on them, even as it splits
them off psychospiritually, politically, and perhaps militarily from a designated “outsider” population,
thereby weakening both populations by depriving each of the strength and wisdom of the other.
Ultimately, the presence or absence of a true sense of humor seems to depend on whether one has ever
loved, and whether one has ever grieved the loss of another. That a sense of humor depends for its
existence upon these most utterly social of experiences should come as no surprise, for it can only exist in
those who identify strongly with one or more groups of others, and are therefore bonded to them. Those
who lack the ability to love can never, ever hope to understand what laughter is really all about. They
may be very, very clever, but will never really understand what triggers the heartiest forms of laughter in
others; they may be very witty, but will never, God help them, be truly wise. And that’s sad, mister – sad,
because there are far too many such running around pretending to be people, forever without a clue of
what it is to be truly human, and never knowing why.

On the Nature and Purpose of Hell,

and Its Anthropology and Mythology
 Hell is not so much a place of punishment as it is Life’s encystation on the planes of spirit of the Evil
One and the damage it has caused. It is the result of the living world’s* attempt to thereby stop the spread
of that hideous cancer.

*”This world,” of which the Lord is traditionally held to be the Evil One, is not the living world, but
rather is just the human socioeconomic and political universe, which is badly corrupted by Evil. The
living world is the world as it would be if Evil had not fastened itself onto it, battening on it all these
centuries, healthy in body, soul, and spirit, the biological/ecological universe of which we ourselves
have been part since the beginning of our existence.

Dante’s Inferno, the clearest and best portrait which Western civilization possesses of Hell, shows us
a place built by Divine Love (Agape) and Divine Justice (Themis) to prevent the Evil One from destroying
us all. Its architecture is the capsule or outer sheath of the cyst; its inhabitants, mired in pus, filth, and
gore, are those souls who have been so badly damaged and corrupted by the Evil One that they themselves
have become its carriers and agents of metastasis. The thing at the center of the Inferno represents the
site of the worst of the damage caused by the assaults of the Evil One on our living world. It is not,
however, the Evil One itself; that being is, by definition, entirely outside the living universe. Hell is
located at the place where the Evil One has touched the living world, in order to encyst the damage caused
by that touch. The Evil One attached itself to the living world at just that place where the latter melds
with the Divine, hence the placement of the exist from Dante’s Inferno.
Saturn, the Planet of restriction and restraint, blockade and barricade, rather than representing Satan,
as Lord of Trouble and Grief, as traditional texts have it, instead represents Hell, Life’s artifact built to
contain the Evil One. Saturn is thus Lord of the Last Line of Defense, God of the End-Game, in the War
between the God of Life and the Evil One.
Where Saturn is in the chart, we are protected. In the natal chart, Saturn indicates where we will
probably need protection, whether against the Evil One or lesser, mundane troubles. Saturn is the Shield
of the Archangel Michael, protecting mortal life against evil, especially spiritual evil. The walls of Hell,
Saturn’s House, are a containment vessel to protect the damaged souls that are put there by Life because
they are too dysfunctional to mingle with others, and need a special environment just to survive; at the
same time, those walls stand between Hell’s occupants and the Evil One, protecting them, Life’s last
desperate attempt to salvage those souls.
Pluto represents Death, the Great Recycler. Death is Life’s tool rather than its destroyer; it is the
chisel of the Great Sculptor, Natural Selection, of which Saturn is the cutting edge. The opposite of Life
isn’t Death, nor is it Entropy, for Life has learned how to harness both to its advantage. The opposite of
Life is evil, which attacks the very spirit of Life, feeding on it in a way which, if not stopped, would
finally destroy the very possibility of future generations of any kind.
From one point of view, Jesus was an avatar or vessel of Binah, Shiva/Kali, Life’s protector. His
teachings may have been the first serious Western attempt to address the common plight and needs of all
life, not just human life. Rather than being commandments, his teachings are descriptions of what Life
ideally does for its creatures, and they, for one another, to perpetuate Life and their own spirits (“Behold
the lilies of the field . . .”). The essence of his teachings is: “You are inalienably part of Life, and as
such, beloved by it. Your true nature is that of an aspect of a living community, ultimately the entire
living cosmos; therefore the road to happiness consists in protecting, cherishing, and preserving
community – truly loving your neighbor as yourself, your Greater Self, as well as loving the Living God,
the Spirit of Life’s Community, with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength – at all costs.
Christianity is also a metaphor for the basic principles of human and general biology and ecology.
Humanity needs religions such as Christianity that teach genuine compassion and restraint in dealing with
others of our own kind, particularly our young, our wise elders, and our females, because we are the
deadliest animal on Earth, who requires something of that nature to keep us from killing ourselves off
through unrestrained predation and aggression. Most predatory animals have such restraints in-built and
hardwired; we don’t, and require sociocultural restraints to do the same job from outside rather than
inside. (Does this make Jesus the most potentially deadly being that ever lived, living and teaching
civilized restraint and compassion as a way of containing his own deadliness and not letting it do harm to
other human beings or the world in general?)

Qaballistic correspondences of Tav:

 Yetziratic text: “The Thirty-second Path is the Administrative Intelligence, and it is so called
because it directs and associates the motions of the seven planets, directing all of them in
their proper courses.”

Yetziratic title: Great One of the Night of Time.

Hebrew letter: ‫( ת‬Tav)

Numerical value: 400

Principle: Manifestation, solidification

Astrological assignment:

Saturn is barren, malefic, cold, dry, magnetic, masculine. With Uranus, it rules
Capricorn and Aquarius; is exalted in Libra and Scorpio; and is the esoteric ruler of Virgo
and Sagittarius. Saturn is also the ruler of the Element of Earth and of the Earthy Triplicity
of Signs, which includes Capricorn, Taurus and Virgo.
In addition to other considerations, Saturn rules many of the same things that Luna
does. In secondary progressions of the horoscope, which is erected for every day after the
time of the birth or other event for which the original horoscope was cast, on average Luna
advances around 12.5 degrees for every year since that original casting was done. On the
other hand, transiting Saturn advances an average of around 12.5 degrees per year. Thus
their celestial motions as well as their astrological influences are similar.

Planetary Age of Man:

Traditionally, Saturn is the ruler of the Seventh Age of life, that of the Ancient,

. . . Last scene of all,

That ends this strange eventful history,
. . . second childishness, and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

– William Shakespeare, As You Like It, II, vii, 139

This age spans ages 68 through physical death, a time when one assesses one’s material
accomplishments, then puts them aside in order to prepare the spirit for one’s eventual death
and translation to other forms of existence.* By the reckoning according to which each of
the Planets rules a decade of life, the Age of Saturn spans ages 61-70, life’s seventh decade.

*The Ages of Man ruled by the Planets beyond Saturn overlap the one ruled by Saturn Himself, but the
influences and functions of the Outer Planets are aspects of those of Saturn, to a great extent, so this
is appropriate. See de Vore, op. cit., 278-279, and Oken, op. cit., p. 212.

Domain: The Earthy realms in general, especially the land; and the Earth as a whole.

Element (Alchemical): Lead

Alchemical references: In the decomposition of materials into their Fiery, Watery, Airy, and
Earthy aspects, Saturn represents that last. In their decomposition into mercury (vapor),
sulfur (an oil), and a salte (calcined ash), Saturn represents the salte.

Metals, stones, gems, and minerals:

 Liber 777:

Key 32: onyx*

Key 32-bis: salt*

De Vore gives garnet, jet, all black stones, and lead. He also notes that all stones, qua
stones, precious as well as semiprecious, are ruled by Saturn as a class, since Saturn is the
ruler of all hard minerals.**
Kunz gives sapphire (which reflects Saturn’s mundane rulership of Aquarius),
chalcedony, sardonyx, topaz, dionesia, halcyon, asbestos, and tin-colored pyrites.†
Oken says that in general, the entire mineral kingdom falls under Saturn’s dominion
(which fits with Saturn’s dominion over the Earth and all in it), but that specifically it is
associated with obsidian, jet, garnet, deep-hued sapphires, and lead.††
Goldstein-Jacobson gives zinc, steel, stone of any kind, granite, quartz, coat, emerald,
agate, ebony, ivory, petrified wood, fossils, and such artificial substances as pewter, pottery,
brick, tile, plaster, cork, linoleum, and rubber.‡ (These last are not true stones, of course,
but they do accord with Saturn’s mundane rulership of Aquarius, which rules technology
prior to the advent of the radio, atomic energy, computer science and technology, and such
innovations as superconductor technology.
An argument could also be made for inclusion of the black star sapphire in these lists,
both because of its color, which is an archetypal color of Saturn, Saturn) and because it
contains a star (according with Saturn’s dominion over the Sign Aquarius). Any extremely
hard stone, or any material which is. for any reason very likely to endure, could also be
added, as could any extremely heavy or dense material, such as, say, neutronium or the
material of a pulsar (a neutron star, a supernova remnant which is extremely dense). Ices of
any kind would fit, because of their temperature (Saturn rules cold), especially those
generated through modern technology (Aquarius). Titanium and any of its oxides might be
appropriate, because of the association of this chemical element with the Titans, of whom
Kronos was leader.
Any material from which strong armor might be made could also be added to the list,
especially that made of materials such as Kevlar, a product of modern technology. For this
reason, tortoise-shell might be considered a “stone” of Saturn, and in fact various kinds of
jewelry are made from it. This material comes from a very long-lived animal; it is used like
a stone in jewelry; and because jewelry has long been an expression of human technology, it
is therefore in the realm of Aquarius.
All fossilized materials fall under the dominion of Saturn and, in the case of fossils from
Deep Time, i.e., before the existence of humanity, when the direct ancestry and descendants
of any given extinct organism can never be determined absolutely, by Uranus. (Fossils found
on other worlds would come under the dominion of Neptune, Pluto, and other Kuyper-Belt
bodies.

*Liber 777: Column XL

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 283.

†Kunz, op. cit., pp. 349-351.

††Oken, op. cit., p. 212.

‡Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 46.

Element (chemical): Lead: Lead is a main-group chemical element with symbol Pb (Latin:
plumbum) and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as
 one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it
soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed to air. Lead has a shiny chrome-silver
luster when it is melted into a liquid. Lead is used in building construction, lead-acid
batteries, bullets and shot, weights, and is part of solder, pewter, fusible alloys. and radiation
shielding. Lead has the highest atomic number of all of the stable elements, although the
next higher element, bismuth, has a half-life that is so long (much longer than the age of the
universe) that it can be considered stable. Its four stable isotopes have 82 protons; a “magic
number” in the nuclear shell model of atomic nuclei. Lead is a poisonous substance to
animals. It damages the nervous system and causes brain disorders. Excessive lead also
causes blood disorders in mammals. Like the element mercury, another heavy metal, lead is
a potent neurotoxin that accumulates both in soft tissues and the bones. Lead poisoning has
been documented from ancient Rome, ancient Greece, and ancient China.

Ecological processes, realms, or principles:

Soil ecology, recycling of minerals over long stretches of time.

Orogeny (the rise and fall of mountains, and the geological processes behind them)
The season and natural processes of Winter at high latitudes
Glaciation, ‘Iceball Earths’ and Ice Ages
Fire as a force for shaping the evolution of ecosystems
Anthropogenic fire and its impact on ecosystems and their evolution and human biology
and ecology*
Population biology (populations as such are ruled by Aquarius)*
The Arctic and Antarctic regions
Disastrous fires, regional firestorms
Alpine and montane regions
Washed-out regions whose topography and geology is the result of disastrous floods,
especially floods due to the melting of glacial dams.
Natural dams (i.e., those not made by human beings or the result of human activities)
and their creation and evolution
Man-made dams and their effects on ecosystems and regions.
Mountain ranges and other natural barriers, e.g., powerful ocean currents, with respect
to marine ecosystems, oceans as barriers to movement of organisms between continents, etc.,
to the movement of organisms in and out of a region

*Saturn, like Uranus, rules Aquarius, which rules humanity in the mass and as a species, and therefore is
associated with everything human does and its impact on the natural world. Aquarius also rules the
atmosphere and everything that affects it, including factors that cause global warming, such as the
addition of countless megatons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere every year by internal combustion
engines, factories, long-burning coal mine fires, fire used to heat homes and cook food, etc.

Physical chemistry:

Solids
Lead (the chemical element, for more on which, see entry under “Element (chemical),”
above).
Zinc (chemical element 30, Zn): Zinc, also known as spelter, is a metallic chemical
element; it has the symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is the first element in group 12 of
the periodic table. Zinc is, in some respects, chemically similar to magnesium, because its
ion is of similar size and its only common oxidation state is +2. Zinc is the 24th most
abundant element in the Earth’s crust and has five stable isotopes. The most exploited zinc
ore is sphalerite, a zinc sulfide. The largest exploitable deposits are found in Australia,
Canada, and the United States. Zinc production includes froth flotation of the ore, roasting,
and final extraction using electricity (electrowinning). Brass, which is an alloy of copper
 and zinc, has been used since at least the 10th century BC. Impure zinc metal was not
produced in large scale until the 13th century in India, while the metal was unknown to
Europe until the end of the 16th century. Alchemists burned zinc in air to form what they
called “philosopher’s wool” or “white snow.” The element was probably named by the
alchemist Paracelsus after the German word Zinke. German chemist Andreas Sigismund
Marggraf is normally given credit for discovering pure metallic zinc in 1746. Work by Luigi
Galvani and Alessandro Volta uncovered the electrochemical properties of zinc by 1800.
Corrosion-resistant zinc plating of steel (hot-dip galvanizing) is the major application for
zinc. Other applications are in batteries and alloys, such as brass. A variety of zinc
compounds are commonly used, such as zinc carbonate and zinc gluconate (as dietary
supplements), zinc chloride (in deodorants), zinc pyrithione (anti-dandruff shampoos), zinc
sulfide (in luminescent paints), and zinc methyl or zinc diethyl in the organic laboratory.
Zinc is an essential mineral of “exceptional biologic and public health importance”. Zinc
deficiency affects about two billion people in the developing world and is associated with
many diseases. In children it causes growth retardation, delayed sexual maturation,
infection susceptibility, and diarrhea, contributing to the death of about 800,000 children
worldwide per year. Enzymes with a zinc atom in the reactive center are widespread in
biochemistry, such as alcohol dehydrogenase in humans. Consumption of excess zinc can
cause ataxia, lethargy and copper deficiency.
Bismuth: Bismuth (Bi, chemical element with atomic number 83). This trivalent poor
metal chemically resembles arsenic and antimony. Bismuth is heavy and brittle; it has a
silvery white color with a pink tinge owing to the surface oxide. Bismuth is the most
naturally diamagnetic of all metals, and only mercury has a lower thermal conductivity. It is
generally considered to be the last naturally occurring stable, non-radioactive element on the
periodic table, although it is actually slightly radioactive. Its only non-synthetic isotope
209
bismuth decays via alpha decay into 205thallium, with an extremely long half-life of 1.9 ×
1019 years. Bismuth compounds are used in cosmetics, medicines, and in medical
procedures. As the toxicity of lead has become more apparent in recent years, alloy uses for
bismuth metal as a replacement for lead have become an increasing part of bismuth’s
commercial importance.
Conversion of gases and liquids to solids, freezing; extreme combustion; radioactive
fission of elements

Physical forces, processes, phenomena, and principles:

Gravity
Entropic processes (which account for the direction of time’s arrow)
Dark matter: In astronomy and cosmology, dark matter is matter that is inferred to exist
from gravitational effects on visible matter and background radiation, but is undetectable by
emitted or scattered electromagnetic radiation. Its existence was hypothesized to account for
discrepancies between measurements of the mass of galaxies, clusters of galaxies and the
entire universe made through dynamical and general relativistic means, and measurements
based on the mass of the visible ‘luminous’ matter these objects contain: stars and the gas
and dust of the interstellar and intergalactic media. According to observations of structures
larger than galaxies, as well as Big Bang cosmology interpreted under the ‘Friedmann
equations’ and the ‘FLRW metric’, dark matter accounts for 23% of the mass-energy density
of the observable universe, while the ordinary matter accounts for only 4.6% (the remainder
is attributed to dark energy). From these figures, dark matter constitutes 80% of the matter
in the universe, while ordinary matter makes up only 20%.
The Strong Force that binds subatomic particles into nucleons: In particle physics, the
strong interaction (also called the strong force, strong nuclear force, or color force) is one of
the four fundamental interactions of nature, along with the electromagnetic force, weak
interaction and gravitation. The word strong is used since, for interactions involving
sufficiently low energies, the strong interaction is the strongest of the four fundamental
forces. Its strength is 100 times that of the electromagnetic force, and several orders of
magnitude greater than the weak force and gravitation. (These ratios are in fact figures of
convenience; the fundamental figures vary dramatically according to the distances over
which the forces are exerted. For example, the “weak” force really is roughly as strong as the
 electromagnetic force at the distances relevant to its effects, which are a small fraction of the
radius of the nucleus of an atom.) The strong interaction is observable in two contexts: On
large scales, it is the force that binds protons and neutrons together to form the nucleus of an
atom; on smaller scales, it is also the force that holds quarks and gluons together to form the
proton, the neutron and other particles.
In physical chemistry, the van der Waäls force (or van der Waäls interaction), named
after Dutch scientist Johannes Diderik van der Waäls, is the attractive or repulsive forces
between molecules (or between parts of the same molecule) other than those due to covalent
bonds or to the electrostatic interaction of ions with one another or with neutral molecules.
The term includes:

force between two permanent dipoles (Van der Waals-Keesom force)

force between a permanent dipole and a corresponding induced dipole (Van der Waals-
Debye force)
force between two instantaneously induced dipoles (London dispersion force or Van der
Waals-London force)

It is also sometimes used loosely as a synonym for the totality of intermolecular forces. Van
der Waäls forces are relatively weak compared to normal chemical bonds, but play a
fundamental role in fields as diverse as supramolecular chemistry, structural biology,
polymer science, nanotechnology, surface science, and condensed matter physics. Van der
Waals forces define the chemical character of many organic compounds. They also define
the solubility of organic substances in polar and non-polar media. In low molecular weight
alcohols, the properties of the polar hydroxyl group dominate the weak intermolecular forces
of van der Waäls. In higher molecular weight alcohols, the properties of the nonpolar
hydrocarbon chain(s) dominate and define the solubility. Van der Waäls-London forces grow
with the length of the nonpolar part of the substance.
The Eridanus Supervoid: Eridanus is a constellation. Represented as a river; its name is
the Ancient Greek name for the Po River. It was one of the 48 constellations listed by the
2nd century astronomer Ptolemy, and it remains one of the 88 modern constellations. It is
the sixth largest of the modern constellations. The Eridanus Supervoid is the largest
supervoid (an area of the universe devoid of galaxies) discovered as of 2007. At a diameter of
about one billion light years it is much larger than any other known void and represents a
challenge for current theories of the origins of the universe to explain. It was discovered by
linking a “cold spot” in the cosmic microwave background to an absence of radio galaxies in
data of the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s Very Large Array Sky Survey.
There is some speculation that the void may be due to quantum entanglement between our
universe and another.

Colors:

Liber 777:

Key 32: King Scale of color, indigo; Queen Scale, black; Emperor Scale,
blue-black; Empress Scale, black, rayed blue.*
Key 32-bis: King Scale, citrine, olive, russet, and black melded together;
Queen Scale, amber; Emperor Scale, dark brown; Empress Scale, black, flecked
yellow.*

Goldstein-Jacobson gives black, deep grey, and green.**

Colors usually associated with Saturn include ashy colors, pale or wan colors and
shades, wooden colors, greens, leaden colors, dark grays, dark browns, black, and hues so
dark they shade into black.†† These are colors which reflect the various influences of
Saturnus/Kronos: maximization of entropy; oppressiveness; agriculture; sylvan areas,
especially those ruled by Pan; destruction; night; cold; endings of things; restraint;
austerity; subdued vs. ornate or flashy expression; conservatism.
Because of His mundane nocturnal rulership of Aquarius, Saturn is also a sky-God,
hence the colors suggestive of the sky may be associated with Him, particularly those of
 leaden overcasts and other oppressive weather conditions. He is also the Lord of Winter,
because of His mundane rulerships of Capricorn and Aquarius and the fact that He is strong
during all cold months and months when the powers of Sol are waning. The colors of snow,
ice, frost, and other cold-weather conditions end precipitations are therefore associated with
Him, as are those of gases and liquid super-cooled by modern technology (Aquarius) into
states not normally found in nature, such as liquid helium or nitrogen, and ices of hydrogen.
For invoking Saturn, I have Found that a black ground striped with crimson and patterned
with Earth-brown quadrilaterals is especially effective.

*Liber 777, Columns XV-XVIII.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 46.

††Black can be a highly depressing color. It is, after all, the Western color of mourning (in the Far East,
the mourning color is white). But when seen as a background against which brilliant stars or
fabulous gemstones are contrasted, it serves to emphasize the beauty of that which is contrasted
against it. Without the “dark between the stars,” those same stars would not seem nearly as beautiful
as they do to us. Black is as essential to the world of experience and esthetic appreciation as any
other color, and spiritually it symbolizes the downside of existence which gives everything else
meaning, just as Saturn represents the manifest structures of skeleton and rock, the former providing
necessary support for the soft tissues of the body that could not otherwise do what was necessary for
the organism’s survival, the latter making possible the variations in height and shape without which
dry land would be no more than low plains unrelieved by mountains, canyons, valleys, or any other
feature, and sea-bottom similarly invariant, with little possibilities for development of the habitats
needed by many forms of complex marine life for their existence.

Patterns and compounds of color:

Gods: Death, the Grim Reaper, is a major correspondent of Saturn. In addition to any Gods and
Goddesses listed here, see Gods listed for Key 31, above, for listings of the Gods of Death in
various cultures.

Greek:

Cybele (Her Sickle is also the Weapon of Saturn)

Demeter
Hekate
Rhea
Hera
Persephone
Adonis
Psyche
Kronos:

Cronus or Kronos (Ancient Greek Κρόνος, Krónos) was the leader and the
youngest of the first generation of Titans, divine descendants of Gaia, the earth, and
Ouranos, the sky. He overthrew his father and ruled during the mythological
Golden Age, until he was overthrown by his own sons, Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon,
and imprisoned in Tartarus. Kronos was usually depicted with a sickle, which was
also the weapon He used to castrate and depose Ouranos, his father. In Athens, on
the twelfth day of the Attic month of Hekatombaion, a festival called Kronia was
held in honor of Kronos to celebrate the harvest, suggesting that, as a result of his
association with the virtuous Golden Age, Kronos continued to preside as a patron
of harvest. Kronos was also identified in classical antiquity with the Roman deity
Saturn.
 Among Hellenistic scholars in Alexandria and during the Renaissance, Kronos
was conflated with the name of Chronos, the personification of “Father Time”,
wielding the harvesting scythe. H. J. Rose, A Handbook of Greek Mythology,
observes that attempts to give Kronos a Greek etymology have failed. A theory
debated in the 19th century, and still offered somewhat apologetically, holds that
Kronos is related to “horned,” assuming a Semitic derivation. Robert Brown made
the assertion in The Great Dionysiak Myth, 1877 that “Kronos signifies ‘the
Horned one’,” the Rev. Alexander Hislop had previously asserted in The Two
Babylons; or, The papal worship proved to be the worship of Nimrod and his wife,
with the note “From krn, a horn. The epithet Carneus applied to Apollo is just a
different form of the same word.” In the Orphic Hymns, Apollo is addressed as ‘the
Two-Horned God’.” Andrew Lang’s objection, that Kronos was never represented
horned in Hellenic art, was addressed by Robert Brown, demonstrating that in
Semitic usage, as in the Hebrew Bible qeren was a signifier of “power.” When
Greek writers encountered the Levantine deity El, they rendered His name as
Kronos.
In ancient myth recorded by Hesiod’s Theogony, Kronos envied the power of
His father, the ruler of the universe, Ouranos. Ouranos drew the enmity of
Kronos’s mother, Gaia, when He hid the gigantic youngest children of Gaia, the
hundred-armed Hecatonchires and one-eyed Cyclopes, in Tartarus, so that They
would not see the light. Gaia created a great stone sickle and gathered together
Kronos and His brothers to persuade Them to castrate Ouranos. Only Kronos was
willing to actually carry out the assault, so Gaia gave Him the sickle and placed
Him in ambush. When Ouranos met with Gaia, Kronos attacked Him father with
the sickle, castrating him and casting his testicles into the sea. From the blood (or,
by a few accounts, semen) that spilled out from Ouranos and fell upon the earth, the
Gigantes (“Giants”), Erinyes (Angry Ones*), and Meliae** were produced. The
testicles produced a white foam from which Aphrodite emerged. For this, Ouranos
threatened vengeance and called His sons Titenes (according to Hesiod, the term
means “straining ones,” the source of the word “Titan”, but this etymology is
disputed) for overstepping their boundaries and daring to commit such an act. (In
an alternate version of this myth, a more benevolent Kronos overthrew the wicked
serpentine Titan Ophion. In doing so, He released the world from bondage, and, for
a time, ruled it justly. After dispatching Ouranos, Kronos re-imprisoned the
Hecatonchires, the Gigantes, and the Cyclopes and set the dragon Campe to guard
them. He and his sister Rhea took the throne of the world as king and queen. This
period of Kronos’ rule was called the Golden Age, as the people of the time had no
need for laws or rules; everyone did the right thing, and immorality was absent.)
Kronos learned from Gaia and Ouranos that He was destined to be overcome by
His own son, just as He had overthrown His father. As a result, although He sired
the Gods Demeter, Hera, Hades, Hestia, and Poseidon by Rhea, He devoured them
all as soon as They were born, to preempt the prophecy. When the sixth child,
Zeus, was born, Rhea sought Gaia to devise a plan to save Them and to eventually
get retribution on Kronos for His acts against His father and His children. Rhea
secretly gave birth to Zeus in Crete, and handed Kronos a stone wrapped in
swaddling clothes, also known as the Omphalos Stone, which he promptly
swallowed, thinking that it was His son. Rhea kept Zeus hidden in a cave on Mount
Ida, Crete. According to some versions of the story, he was then raised by a goat
named Amalthea, while a company of Kouretes, armored male dancers, shouted and
clapped their hands to make enough noise to mask the baby’s cries from Kronos.
Other versions of the myth have Zeus raised by the nymph Adamanthea, who hid
Zeus by dangling Him in a cradle by a rope from a tree so that He was suspended
between the earth, the sea, and the sky, all of which were ruled by His father,
Kronos. Still other versions of the tale say that Zeus was raised by his grandmother,
Gaia.
Once He had reached manhood, Zeus used a poison given to Him by Gaia to
force Kronos to disgorge the contents of his stomach in reverse order: first the
stone, which was set down at Pytho under the glens of Mount Parnassus to be a sign
to mortal men, then the goat, and then His two brothers and three sisters. In other
versions of the tale, Metis gave Kronos an emetic to force Him to disgorge the
children, or Zeus cut Kronos’ stomach open. After freeing his siblings, Zeus
released the Gigantes, the Hecatonchires, and the Cyclopes, Who forged His
thunderbolts for Him. In a vast war called the Titanomachy, Zeus and His brothers
and sisters, with the help of the Gigantes, Hecatonchires, and Cyclopes, overthrew
Kronos and the other Titans. Afterwards, many of the Titans were confined in
Tartarus. Some Titans were not banished to Tartarus: Atlas, Epimetheus,
Menoetius, Oceanus and Prometheus are examples of Titans who were not
imprisoned in Tartarus following the Titanomachy. Gaia bore the monster Typhon
to claim revenge for the imprisoned Titans, though Zeus was victorious.
Accounts of the fate of Kronos after the Titanomachy differ. In Homeric and
other texts He is imprisoned with the other Titans in Tartarus. In Orphic poems,
He is imprisoned for eternity in the cave of Nyx. Pindar describes His release from
Tartarus, where he is made King of Elysium by Zeus. In another version, the Titans
released the Cyclopes from Tartarus, and Kronos was awarded the kingship among
them, beginning a Golden Age. In Virgil’s Aeneid, it is Latium to which Saturn
(Kronos) escapes and ascends as king and lawgiver, following His defeat by his son
Jupiter (Zeus).
Other children Kronos is reputed to have fathered include Chiron the Centaur,
whom He got on the nymph Philyra who fled from His advances after changing
herself into a mare. Kronos then changed himself into a stallion and mounted the
mare, who became pregnant by Him with Chiron. When Chiron was born, seeing
his half-human, half-equine form, Philyra was so revolted by her son that she
abandoned him, who was rescued and raised by Pallas Athena and Hermes.†
In a Libyan account related by Diodorus Siculus (1st c. BC), Kronos or Saturn,
son of Ouranos and Titea, is said to have reigned over Italy, Sicily, and Northern
Africa. He cites as evidence the heights in Sicily that were in his time known as
Cronia. Kronos, joined by the Titans, makes war against and eventually defeats his
brother Jupiter, who reigns in Crete, and his brother-in-law Hammon, who reigns at
Nysa, an island on the river Triton, somewhere in Africa. Kronos takes his sister
Rhea from Hammon, to be his own wife. Kronos in turn is defeated by Hammon’s
son Bacchus or Dionysius, who appoints Kronos’ and Rhea’s son, Jupiter Olympus,
as governor over Egypt. Bacchus and Jupiter Olympus then join their forces to
defeat the remaining Titans in Crete, and on the death of Bacchus, Jupiter Olympus
inherits all the kingdoms, becoming lord of the world. (Diodorus, Book III)
Kronos is again mentioned in the Sibylline Oracles, particularly book three,
which makes Kronos, ‘Titan’ and Iapetus, the three sons of Ouranos and Gaia, each
to receive a third division of the Earth, and Kronos is made king over all. After the
death of Ouranos, Titan’s sons attempt to destroy Kronos’ and Rhea’s male
offspring as soon as they are born, but at Dodona, Rhea secretly bears her sons
Zeus, Poseidon and Hades and sends them to Phrygia to be raised in the care of
three Cretans. Upon learning this, sixty of Titan’s men then imprison Kronos and
Rhea, causing the sons of Kronos to declare and fight the first of all wars against
them. This account mentions nothing about Kronos either killing his father or
attempting to kill any of his children.
When Hellenes encountered Phoenicians and later, Hebrews, they identified the
Semitic El, by interpretatio graeca, with Kronos. The association was recorded ca.
AD 100 by Philo of Byblos’ Phoenician history, as reported in Eusebius’
Præparatio Evangelica I.10.16. Philo’s account, ascribed by Eusebius to the semi-
legendary pre-Trojan War Phoenician historian Sanchuniathon, indicates that
Kronos was originally a Canaanite ruler who founded Byblos and was subsequently
deified. This version gives his alternate name as Elus or Ilus, and states that in the
32nd year of his reign, he emasculated, slew and deified his father Epigeius or
Autochthon “whom they afterwards called Ouranos”. It further states that after
ships were invented, Kronos, visiting the ‘inhabitable world’, bequeathed Attica to
his own daughter Athena, and Egypt to Thoth the son of Misor and inventor of
writing.
 While the Greeks considered Kronos a cruel and tempestuous force of chaos
and disorder, believing the Olympian gods had brought an era of peace and order by
seizing power from the crude and malicious Titans, the Romans took a more
positive and innocuous view of the deity, by conflating their indigenous deity Saturn
with Kronos. Consequently, while the Greeks considered Kronos merely an
intermediary stage between Ouranos and Zeus, he was a larger aspect of Roman
religion. The Saturnalia was a festival dedicated in his honor, and at least one
temple to Saturn already existed in the archaic Roman Kingdom.
His association with the “Saturnian” Golden Age eventually caused him to
become the god of “human time”, i.e., calendars, seasons, and harvests — not to be
confused with Chronos, the unrelated embodiment of time in general.
As a result of Kronos’ importance to the Romans, his Roman variant, Saturn,
has had a large influence on Western culture. The seventh day of the Judaeo-
Christian week is called in Latin Dies Saturni (“Day of Saturn”), which in turn was
adapted and became the source of the English word Saturday. In astronomy, the
planet Saturn is named after the Roman deity. It is the seventh and outermost of the
seven planets that are visible with the naked eye.
Pan
Χαοζ (for Saturn’s association with Da’ath)

*In Greek mythology the Erinýes (Eρινύες, pl. of Eρινύς, Erinýs; literally “the angry ones”) or Eumenídes
(Εửμενίδες, pl. of Εửμενίς; literally “the gracious ones” but also translated as “Kind-hearted Ones” or
“Kindly Ones”), or Furies or Dirae in Roman mythology, were female chthonic deities of vengeance
or supernatural personifications of the anger of the dead. They represent regeneration and the potency
of creation, which both consumes and empowers. A formulaic oath in the Iliad (iii.278ff; xix.260ff)
invokes them as “those who beneath the earth punish whosoever has sworn a false oath.” Burkert
suggests they are “an embodiment of the act of self-cursing contained in the oath.”

**In Greek mythology, the Meliae or Meliai (Ancient Greek: Μελίαι or Μελιάδες) were nymphs of the
ash tree, whose name they shared. They appeared from the drops of blood spilled when Cronus
castrated Uranus, according to Hesiod, Theogony 187. From the same blood sprang the Erinyes,
suggesting that the ash-tree nymphs represented the Fates in milder guise (Graves 6.4). From the
Meliae sprang the race of mankind of the Age of Bronze. The Meliae belong to a class of sisterhoods
whose nature is to appear collectively and who are invoked in the plural, though genealogical myths,
especially in Hesiod, give them individual names, such as Melia, “but these are quite clearly
secondary and carry no great weight” (Burkert 1985 III.3.2). The Melia thus singled out is one of
these daughters of Oceanus. By her brother the river-god Inachus, she became the mother of Io,
Phoroneus, Aegialeus or Phegeus, and Nilodice. In other stories, she was the mother of Amycus by
Poseidon, as the Olympian representative of Oceanus. Many species of Fraxinus, the ash trees, exude
a sugary substance, which the ancient Greeks called méli, “honey”. The species of ash in the
mountains of Greece is the Manna-ash (Fraxinus ornus). The Meliae were nurses of the infant Zeus in
the Cretan cave of Dikte, according to Callimachus, Hymn to Zeus. They fed Him honey.

†In Greek mythology, Chiron (also Cheiron or Kheiron) (Greek: Χείρων; “hand”) was held to be the
superlative centaur among his brethren. Like the satyrs, centaurs were notorious for being overly
indulgent drinkers and carousers, given to violence when intoxicated, and generally uncultured
delinquents. Centaur were also wild and lusty. Chiron, by contrast, was intelligent, civilized and kind.
He was known for his knowledge and skill with medicine. According to an archaic myth he was sired
by Kronos when Kronos had taken the form of a horse and impregnated the nymph Philyra, Chiron’s
lineage was different from other centaurs, who were born of sun and rain-cloud, rendered by Greeks
of the Classic period as from the union of the king Ixion,‡ consigned to a fiery wheel, and Nephele
(“cloud”), which in the Olympian telling Zeus invented to look like Hera. Myths in the Olympian
tradition attributed Chiron’s uniquely peaceful character and intelligence to teaching by Apollo and
Artemis in his younger days. Chiron’s haunts were on Mount Pelion; there he married the nymph
Chariclo who bore him three daughters, Hippe (with a daughter Melanippe, the “Black Mare” or
Euippe, “truly a mare”), Endeis, and Ocyrhoe, and one son Carystus. A great healer, astrologer, and
respected oracle, Chiron was said to be the first among centaurs and highly revered as a teacher and
 tutor. Among his pupils were many culture heroes: Asclepius, Aristaeus, Ajax, Aeneas, Actaeon,
Caeneus, Theseus, Achilles, Jason, Peleus, Telamon, sometimes Heracles, Oileus, Phoenix, and in
one Byzantine tradition, even Dionysus: according to Ptolemaeus Chennus of Alexandria, “Dionysius
was loved by Chiron, from whom he learned chants and dances, the bacchic rites and initiations.”

‡In Greek mythology, Ixion (Greek: Ιξίων, Ixīōn) was king of the Lapiths, the most ancient tribe of
Thessaly, whose father was variously said to be Ares, Antion, or the notorious evildoer Phlegyas,
whose name connotes “fiery.” Peirithoös was his son (or stepson, if Zeus were his father, as the Sky-
God claims to Hera in Iliad 14). Ixion married Dia, a daughter of Deioneus (or Eioneus) and
promised his father-in-law a valuable present. However, he did not pay the bride price, so Deioneus
stole some of Ixion’s horses in retaliation. Ixion concealed his resentment and invited his father-in-
law to a feast at Larissa. When Deioneus arrived, Ixion pushed him into a bed of burning coals and
wood. These circumstances are secondary to the fact of Ixion’s primordial act of murder; it could be
accounted for quite differently: in the Greek Anthology (iii.12), among a collection of inscriptions
from a temple in Cyzicus is an epigrammatic description of Ixion slaying Phorbas and Polymelos,
who had slain his mother, Megara, the “great one”. Defiled by his murder of his father-in-law and
violation of xenia, the Greek concept of hospitality, or courtesy and kindness shown to those far from
home, Ixion went mad. Neighboring princes were so offended by this act of treachery and violation
of xenia that they refused to perform the rituals that would cleanse Ixion of his guilt. Thereafter Ixion
lived as an outlaw and shunned. By killing his father-in-law, Ixion was reckoned the first man guilty
of kin-slaying in Greek mythology. That alone would warrant him a terrible punishment.
However, Zeus had pity on Ixion and brought him to Olympus and introduced him at the table of
the gods. Instead of being grateful, Ixion grew lustful for Hera, Zeus’s wife, a further violation of
guest-host relations. Zeus found out about his intentions and made a cloud in the shape of Hera,
which became known as Nephele (nephos, “cloud”) and tricked Ixion into coupling with it. From the
union of Ixion and the false-Hera cloud came Centauros, who covered the Magnesian mares on
Mount Pelion, Pindar told, engendering the race of Centaurs, who are called the Ixionidae from their
descent. Ixion was expelled from Olympus and blasted with a thunderbolt. Zeus ordered Hermes to
bind Ixion to a winged fiery wheel that was always spinning; only when Orpheus played his lyre did it
stop for a while. Therefore, Ixion is bound to a burning solar wheel for all eternity, at first spinning
across the heavens, but in later myth transferred to Tartarus. “The details are very odd, the narrative
motivation creaks at every juncture,” observes Robert L. Fowler; “the myth smacks of aetiology.” He
notes that Martin Nilsson suggested] an origin in rain-making magic, with which he concurs: “In
Ixion’s case the necessary warning about the conduct of magic has taken the form of blasphemous
and dangerous conduct on the part of the first officiant.” In the fifth century, Pindar’s Second
Pythian Ode (ca. 476-68 BCE) expands on the example of Ixion, applicable to Hiero I of Syracuse,
the tyrant of whom the poet sings; and Aeschylus, Euripides and Timasitheos each wrote a tragedy of
Ixion: none have survived. Ixion was a figure also known to the Etruscans, for he is depicted bound
to the spoked wheel, engraved on the back of a bronze mirror, ca 460-450 BCE, in the British
Museum. Whether the Etruscans shared the Ixion figure with Hellenes from early times or whether
Ixion figured among those Greek myths that were adapted at later dates to fit the Etruscan world-
view, the figure on the mirror-back is shown as winged, a characteristic shared with Etruscan
daimones and Underworld figures rather than human heroes. Etruscan mythology selected for
emphasis many Greek myths that, like Ixion’s fate, could be read as admonitory warnings.

Roman:

Ceres, as Goddess of the grain and the harvest. Ceres was a goddess of agriculture,
grain crops, fertility and motherly relationships. Her cult took many forms. She was the
central deity in Rome’s so-called plebeian or Aventine Triad, and was paired with her
daughter Proserpina in what Romans described as "the Greek rites of Ceres," analogous
to the Rites of Eleusis. She played an essential role in Roman marriage and in funeral
rites. Her seven-day April festival of Cerealia included the popular Ludi Ceriales (Ceres’
games). She was honoured in the May lustration of fields at the Ambarvalia festival, and
at harvest-time. Her functions and cults were held equivalent to those of the Greek
goddess Demeter, whose mythology She came to share.
 Saturnus: Saturn (Latin: Saturnus) was a major Roman god of agriculture and
harvest, whose reign was depicted as a Golden Age of abundance and peace by many
Roman authors. In medieval times He was known as the Roman god of agriculture,
justice and strength; He held a sickle in his left hand and a bundle of wheat in his right.
His mother was Terra and his father was Caelus. He was identified in classical antiquity
with the Greek deity Cronus/Kronos, and the mythologies of the two gods are commonly
mixed, though Kronos’s tyrannical reign over Gods and men was anything but benign,
while Saturnus’s rule brought peace and plenty to all. Saturn’s wife was Ops (the
Roman equivalent of Rhea). Saturn was the father of Ceres, Jupiter, Veritas,* Pluto, and
Neptune, among others. Saturn had a temple on the Forum Romanum which contained
the Royal Treasury, reflecting the wealth that His rule brought to the world. Saturn is
the namesake of both Saturn, the planet, and Saturday (dies Saturni).
Juno:
(The Romans inherited all the Greek Gods, Who had much the same functions in
the Roman pantheon as They did in the Creek, in spite of name-changes, though there
were significant differences in Their mythologies from one system to the other.)

*In Roman mythology, Veritas, meaning truth, was the Goddess of truth, a daughter of Saturn and the
mother of Virtue. It was believed that She hid in the bottom of a holy well because she was so elusive.
Her image is shown as a young virgin dressed in white. Veritas is also the name given to the Roman
virtue of truthfulness, which was considered one of the main virtues any good Roman should have
possessed. In Greek mythology, Veritas was known as Aletheia.

Egyptian:

Nephthys (Black Isis)

Maut (Meat)
Isis
Seb
Osiris
Set
Sebek
Mako
Satem
Ahapsh
Illaeshet.

USA:
Celtic:
Hindu:

Durga
Kali
Parvati
Chandi
Bhavani
Sakti
Prana (as primal Force)
Yoni, Lakshmi
Kundalini (as primal Force)
Brahma
Prithvi.

Buddhism:
Voudon:
 Obaluaye or Babalu
Baron Samedhi.

SubGenius:

SubGenius: JHVHI, creator God, Whose temperament can be cruel and unjust at
times
Nhee-Ghee, Author of All Our Miseries, but also of the temptation to fall to the
things that make us feel so much better
Bad “Bob,” an imp of Nhee-Ghee and Qlipphotic mirror of J. R. “Bob” Dobbs
J. R. “Jim” Dobbs, “Bob”‘s evil twin
Nunu, the Great Mother, an incredibly ancient Goddess of Sex, Death and Re-
Erection.

Discordianism:

Eris Herself
Elmer Fudd
Lord Murphy (see below)

H. P. Lovecraft: Take your pick. In particular, Shub-Niggurath, the Goat With a Thousand
Young.
Stephen King: All suggestions welcome . . .
LaVeyan Satanism:
Szekely (Romany Gypsy):
Chinese:
Japanese: Void (the Element) (for Saturn’s association with Da’ath)
Judaism: ‫( מיהלא הוהי‬Jaweh Elohim; “Jaweh” actually recapitulates the vowels I-A-O-U-E,
sung or howled rather than spoken in a normal tone, and without consonants, hence
“unpronounceable” or “unspeakable,” since to speak normally requires the use of
consonants) (God Most High).
Christianity: God the Father

God the Father

Mary Mother of Christ (represented by the Pieta, the Mother of Sorrows weeping
over the body of Her dead Son)
Satan, Arch-Tempter and Adversary

Islam: Allah
Yezidi: Shaîtan.
Scandinavian/Norse:

Odin (Odin demanded a tribute of human sacrifice in the form of slain warriors
killed in battles)
Frigga
Hel
Ginnungagap (for Saturn’s association with Da’ath)

The French Enlightenment: Liberté, Fraternité

Russian:
Hungarian:
African:
Southeast Asia:
Oceania: Ta’aroa (Kanaloa), God of Hell and the Deep
Native Australian:
Eskimo:
 Central American:
American Indian:
American folklore: Murphy, He Who Screws Everything Up.
Science-fiction:
The Land of Oz: Ruggedo, the Gnome-King; Roquat the Red

Biblical associations:

Commandment from Exodus:

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and
do all your work; but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God; in it
you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your manservant,
or your maidservant, or your cattle, or the sojourner who is within your gates;
for in sex days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them,
and rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and
hallowed it.

Exodus 20:5

Ten Plagues of Egypt:

Plague of darkness (Exodus 10:21-29); plague of water turned to blood (Exodus

7:20-24)

Verses of the Creation Story from Genesis (Genesis1-3):

Saturnus:

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.
And on the seventh day God finished his work which he had done, and he
rested on the seventh day from all the work he had completed. So God
blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all
his work which he had done in creation.

Genesis 2:1-3

Kronos

Now the serpent was more subtle than any other wild creature that the
Lord God had made. He said to the woman, ‘did God say, “You shall not
eat of any tree of the garden”?’ And the woman said to the serpent, ‘He
said we could any of the fruit of the trees of the garden, except for the tree
in the middle of the garden. God told us that we shouldn’t touch it, or we
would die.’ And the serpent said to her, ‘You won’t die if you do that. For
God knows that if you eat of the fruit of that tree your eyes will be opened
by it, and you’ll be just like God, knowing good from evil.’ When the
woman saw that the tree bore fruit that was good food, and that it was
beautiful to look at, and that the fruit of the tree could make one wise, she
took some of its fruit and ate it, and then gave some to her husband, who
also ate of it. Then the eyes of both were opened, and the two of them
knew that they were both naked. So they sewed fig leaves together to make
aprons, and put them on for clothes.
Then they heard God, who was walking in the garden in the cool of
the day, an the man and his wife hid themselves from God among the trees
of the garden. But God called out to the man, and asked him, ‘Where are
you?’ The man answered, ‘I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid,
because I was naked, so I hid myself.’ God asked him, ‘Who told you that
 you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree which I told you never to eat
of?’
The man told him, ‘The woman you gave me for a wife gave me fruit
from that tree, and I ate it.’ So God turned to the woman, and asked her,
‘Woman, what have you done?’ She told him, ‘The serpent told me to do
it.’ So God turned to the serpent, and told it: ‘Because you did this, you’ll
be cursed beyond all cattle and wild animals. You’ll go on your belly all
the days of your life, and the woman will be your enemy, and her children
will be your children’s enemies forever. They’ll crush your head, and
you’ll bite their heels.’
Turning to the woman, God told her, ‘I will multiply your pain in
childbirth until it is agony. You’ll bring forth your children in agony, and
yet you won’t be able to stop lusting after your husband, who will be your
master.’
Then, turning to Adam (‘red clay’), he told him, God told him,
‘Because you did what your wife told you to do in this matter, schmuck,
eating the things I told you not to, the ground will be cursed because of
you. You’ll labor all your life to wrest a living from it; it’ll grow thorns
and thistles you’ll have to work incessantly to get rid of, and you’ll have to
eat the plants you grow and harvest from the ground yourself. Only by
working like a horse will you be able to eat, until the day you are buried;
for out of the dust of the earth you were created, and like the dust you are,
to dust you will return.’
And the man called his wife ‘Evah,’ ‘the little darling,’ because she
was the mother of all living. And God made garments out of skins for
Adam and Eve to wear, and clothed them with the garments.
Then God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of us, now,
knowing good from evil. Now, so that he won’t eat fruit from the Tree of
Life and become immortal, as well, he must go.’ So God sent Adam and
his wife out of the garden of Eden, to till the ground out of which he was
created. After driving them out, God placed the Cherubim on the east side
of the Garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to
guard the way to the Tree of Life.*

Genesis 3

*This could well be an orally preserved memory of a time before the last Ice Age or during a
more clement portion during the Ice Age or after it, when human beings lived in a
paradisiacal area somewhere in what is now the Middle East. Either human overpopulation
or, possibly, onset of an Ice Age due to the impact of a comet somewhere on the Earth then
eliminated the original conditions, forcing human beings to emigrate from what had been a
paradise to find arable land from which they could earn a living. By that time, agriculture
may already have been invented, but hadn’t stripped the soil of its minerals until the area’s
carrying-capacity was exceeded by its human population. Some anthropologists conjecture
that the ‘Garden of Eden’ lay somewhere in the region of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers,
and that the emigration from that area was toward the east, that is, toward the region that is
now Turkey.

Other sections of the Bible:

The Book of Job

Ecclesiastes 3, OT
Revelation, NT
 Cantos from the Inferno of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos XXXI-XXXIII

Cantos from the Purgatorio of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos XXII-XXIV

Cantos from the Paradiso of Dante Alighieri:

Cantos XXI-XXII

To some extent, the entirety of Dante’s Inferno is associated with Saturn, as is his
Purgatorio, since Saturn rules purges of all kinds, medical and political as well as any other.

Buddhist meditation:

Key 32: Quiescence*

Key 32-bis: Earth*

*Liber 777, Column XXIII.

Magickal Power:

For Magickal Powers, Liber 777 gives Works of Malediction and Death (Key 32); and
Alchemy, Geomancy and the Making of Pantacles (Key 32 bis).

Magickal Weapon:

Liber 777:

Key 32: the Sickle or Scythe

Key 32-bis: the Pantacle, or Salt

Day of the Week ruled by Saturn:

Geocentric: Traditionally, the seventh day of the week (Saturday); hours after sunset of
the second day of the week (Monday)

Heliocentric: Same

Hours of the Day ruled by Saturn:

Geocentric: Traditionally, the first, eighth, and fifteenth sixty-minute periods after
dawn and the third, tenth, and seventeenth sixty-minute periods after sunset on the seventh
day of the week; also, the third, tenth, and seventeenth sixty-minute periods after sunset on
the second day of the week. In general, any hour preceded by one ruled by Luna and
followed by one ruled by Jupiter.

Heliocentric: The first, eighth, and fifteenth sixty-minute periods after dawn and the
third, tenth, and seventeenth sixty-minute periods after sunset on the seventh day of the
week; also, the third, tenth, and seventeenth sixty-minute periods after sunset on the second
 day of the week. In general, any hour preceded by one ruled by Sol and followed by one
ruled by Jupiter.

God-Name in Hebrew: ‫מיהלא הוהי‬

World Religions:

SubGenius Cult of Nhee-Ghee (Left-Hand Path of SubGenius)

Titan cult of pre-Olympic Greece
Cybele cults
Judaism
Confucianism
Shaîtanism (pre-Islamic Yezidi cult of the “Peacock Archangel”)
Ninpo taijutsu (in its wisdom aspects, and as it teaches conservatism – “go with the
flow”)

Archangel:

l a y q p x (Tzaphqiel):

Angelic Choir:

\ y l a r a (Aralim)

Angel:

Cassiel

Angels given by Bardon, Barrett, Davidson, et al.:

Cassiel, Machaton, Uriel, Maymon, Abumalith, Assaibi, Balidet

Olympic Planetary Spirit:

Aratron

Seal

Intelligence:

l a y g a (Agiel)
 Sigil of Agiel

Intelligences given by Bardon, Barrett, Davidson, et al.:

Mael, Orael, Valnum

Spirit:

l z a z (Zazel)

Sigil of Zazel

Spirits given by Bardon, Barrett, Davidson, et al.:

Sammael, Bachiel, Astel

Messengers given by Bardon, Barrett, Davidson, et al.:

Sachiel, Zoniel, Hubaril

Name of Planet in Hebrew:

y a t b c (Sabbathai)

Grade of the Temple:

8° = 3π, Magister Templi

Articles of the Bill of Rights:

Amendment III
Conditions for quartering soldiers

No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house without the

consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by
law.

Amendment X
Rights of States under Constitution

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor
prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the
people.
 Musical tone: A natural

Orders of Qlippoth:

l a y r a t a s (Satariel, “Hiding”)

Qlippothic Spirit (from Kenneth Grant):

Thantifaxath, whose number is 1040 and whose name should be reverberated in the key
of B sharp as if in the hollow of chthonian deeps. His sigil should be painted on a black
rectangle rayed with blue.

Legendary orders of being:

Key 32: Ghuls (eaters of dead human flesh and/or those who steal from the dead),*
Larvae (ghosts), corpse-candles (Hand of Glory?)**
Key 32-bis: The Dweller at the Threshold, Gnomes**

Aaaaaaaaaa

*Ghouls have their origin in the Arabic/Persian/Indian tales of Alf Laylah wa Laylah - the Thousand
Nights and a Night and in their root stories. As such, Sir Richard F. Burton, ninteeth century
translator of the Nights, has a fair amount to say about them in the foot notes of his translation. The
male Ghul, he paints as a creature who eats human flesh:

Arab. “Ghul,: here an ogre, a cannibal. I cannot but regard the “Ghul of the waste” as an
embodiment of the natural fear and horror which a man feels when he faces a really
dangerous desert. As regards cannibalism, Al-Islam’s religion of common sense freely
allows it when necessary to save life, and unlike our mawkish modern sensibility never
blames those who

Alimentis talibus usi

Produxere animos.
vi. 36

[That is: “Employing such food extend lives.”]

Ghuls in the Nights are rather fearsome, and do not seem to prey on humanity mearly through
necessity. Their appetite is nearly insatiable:

Allah ease thee, O King of the age even as thou hast eased me of these Ghuls,
whose bellies none may fill save Allah! ix. p. 152

Even their names are fearsome, such as “The-Ghul-who-eateth-man-we-pray-to-Allah-for-

safety.”

Burton had some additional comments on the female Ghuls and the origin of the word “ghul”:

The Ghulah (Fem. of Ghul) is the Heb. Lilith or Lilis: the classical Lamia; the
Hindu Yogni and Dakini; the Chaldean Utug and Gigim (desert-demons) as
opposed to the Mas (Hill-demon) and Telal (who steal into towns); the Ogress of out
tales and the Bala yaga (Granny-witch) of Russian folk-lore. Etymologicaly “Ghul”
is a calamity, a panic fear; and the monster is evidently the embodied horror of the
grave and the graveyard. i. p55

See http://home.comcast.net/~chris.s/ghul.html.
**Liber 777, Column CLXXXIII.

Plants, real and imaginary:

Liber 777:

Key 32: ash, cypress, hellebore, yew, and nightshade*

Key 32-bis: oak and ivy**.

According to John Lust,, Saturn rules: i) plants with cooling qualities, such as barley,
comfrey root, tamarind, and willow†; 2) woody shrubs or trees that show annual rings,
resembling Saturn’s own rings, such as elm, cypress, and pine; 3) poisonous or narcotic
plants, such as aconite, cannabis, hellebore, hemlock, mezereon, monkshood, marijuana, and
yew; and 4) others such as quince, red beet, Solomon’s seal, and sloes.††
Goldstein-Jacobson gives bitter herbs and roots, and pickling spices.‡
De Vore gives aconite, barley, barren wort, beech, black hellebore, blue bottle, comfrey,
crosswort, flax-weed, flea-wort, fumitory, gladwin, ground moss, hemlock, hemp, henbane,
holly, horsetail, ivy, jew’s ear, knap-weed, knot-grass, mandrake, mangel, medlar, moss,
navel-wort, nightshade, pansies, parsnips, quince, rue, rupture wort, rushes, rye, sciatica
wort, senna, shepherd’s purse, sloes, Solomon’s seal, spinach, tamarisk, vervain,
wintergreen.‡‡
Oken gives hemlock, nightshade, rue, senna, comfrey, hemp, holly, spinach, ivy,
wintergreen, barley, moss, mandrake, cypress, elm, willow, and pine. ‡‡‡
In general, Saturn rules the following classes of plants:
1) those that produce substances we process for use as pain-killers, such as opiates,
aspirin, topically applied cocaine, and other analgesics (Saturn rules grinding, chronic, or
otherwise debilitating pain;†
2) all poisonous plants, such as nightshade, mandrake (which is also a potent Magickal
agent), aconite, hellebore, hemlock, mezereon, monkshood, and yew;
3) all cereal grains, such as rice, wheat, rye, barley, and oats.
4) plants rich in vitamin C, which includes, among others, all those producing green
vegetables, many of which are dark green in color (Saturn rules dark green colors);
5) narcotic plants, such as marijuana, opium poppies, and ephedra (from which is
extracted ephedrine, a potent stimulant from which is made methamphetamine);
and 6) plants producing substances that can be processed into drugs such as
tranquilizers (a.k.a. neuroleptics or antipsychotics). Minor tranquilizers can also be broken
down into two main categories: barbiturates, which are used to treat anxiety, tension, and
sleep disorders; and benzodiazepines (BZDs), which can be prescribed to treat anxiety,
severe stress reactions, and panic attacks. The first major tranquilizer was developed from
Rauwolfia serpentina, also known as Indian snakeroot. Rauwolfia is known for its ability to
lower blood pressure. Used for many years in India for the treatment of serious mental
illness, it was frequently referred to there as the “insanity herb.” Most often, its roots were
crushed and consumed in a tea. In 1943 an Indian physician named Rustom Jal Vakil (1911–
1974) wrote about the plant’s success in treating mental illness. It wasn’t long before
Western doctors began studying Rauwolfia, hoping that it could help patients with severe
psychiatric disorders. American doctor Robert Wallace Wilkins (1906–2003) of Boston
University Medical School conducted extensive research on Rauwolfia serpentina after
hearing about its use in India. In 1954, he showed that reserpine, an alkaloid, a nitrogen-
containing substance found in plants, and the active ingredient. The chemical or substance
in a compound known or believed to have a therapeutic, or healing, effect in Rauwolfia was
successful in treating both high blood pressure and severe psychiatric disorders such as
schizophrenia and other psychoses. Almost immediately the new drug (sold under the brand
name Serpasil) became the most popular way to treat such disorders. Herbs such as valerian,
kava, and lavender produce tranquilizing effects and have been used by various cultures for
centuries. There were no alternatives to natural tranquilizers until the 1860s, when the first
 synthetic minor tranquilizer, bromide, was created. (Synthetic drugs are those created in a
laboratory.) But the dangerous side effects it produced made it rather unpopular. The drug
caused stomach problems and, if taken for a long time, proved toxic (harmful or poisonous).
Bromides were replaced by barbiturates in 1903. Barbiturates are effective in reducing
anxiety and causing drowsiness, but can very quickly become addictive or habit-forming.
Amytal, Nembutal, and Seconal are all examples of barbiturates. The danger with
barbiturates is the high rate of death connected with overdose. An overdose of barbiturates
affects the heart and the respiratory system, causing shortness of breath, extreme drowsiness,
and an unusually slow heart rate. The user then slips into a coma, a state of unconsciousness
from which a person cannot be aroused by noise or other stimuli. and dies. Because of this,
chemists knew they had to find an alternative to barbiturates – a drug that could ease anxiety
without slowing breathing rates to dangerously low levels. The answer came with the
discovery of benzodiazepines. Clearly such drugs are both narcotic and potentially
poisonous, hence are doubly ruled by Saturn.

* Liber 777, Column XXXIX.

**Liber 777, Column XXXIX. Ivy is an Earth-vine; and there is a Roman tradition that Jupiter inherited
the oak-grove as an oracle from his father, Saturnus.

†The willow is the original source of salicylic acid, the main ingredient of aspirin. Saturn is Luna’s
higher octave. Aspirin, which relieves the pain and discomfort of menstrual cramps, is associated
with Hekate, Who rules, among other things, Black Magick and other works of malediction, elderly
women, menopause and menstruation. Hekate is a Lunar Goddess; but She is also a Saturnian one,
due to Her association with post-menopausal women and maleficent forms of Magick.
Nota bene: It may be argued that it is Neptune Who rules analgesics, as He does anesthetics and
soporific drugs of all kinds, since so many pain-killers, e.g., the opiates, are also addictive drugs. But
before Uranus and the Planets beyond Him were discovered telescopically, Western astrology had
only Saturn to represent the domains which today are ruled not only by Him, but by the other Outer
Planets, as well. As I have discussed elsewhere, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto in a sense represent
three primary aspects of Saturn’s nature and influence, especially in their collective expression. If so,
Saturn hasn’t lost these aspects of Himself; He has only gained Planetary delegates to take care of
such matters for Him on the collective level. Hence while Neptune does rule analgesics, especially
those prone to be used by addicts, Saturn still returns His dominion over these, especially in terms of
His traditional functions.

††Lust, op. cit., p. 573.

‡Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. p. 44.

‡‡De Vore, op. cit., p. 501.

‡‡‡Oken, op. cit., p. 212.

Animals, Real and Imaginary:

Liber 777:

Key 32: the crocodile*

Key 32-bis: the Bull (the Cherub of Earth) *

Goldstein-Jacobson gives goats (which are primarily associated with Saturn via His
diurnal mundane rulership of Capricorn)‡‡, mules, camels, oxen, draft-horses, animals
 yoked as beasts of burden, and those whose hides give us leather; bears, snakes, rodents and
snails, carrion birds, scavengers, birds of prey, and spiders.**
By extrapolation, I would include all poisonous animals and plants, and all predatory
organisms, of whatever kind, as well as such predatory and carnivorous plants as the Venus
Fly-Trap; all animals encased in strong armor, such as the turtle and the armadillo, or in
interesting defensive covering, such as the porcupine and his quills; all very large, heavy
organisms;† and all those which typically live to a relatively great age, such as parrots,
tortoises, elephants, certain redwoods and evergreens, and human beings.‡

*Liber 777, Column XXXVIII.

**Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

†I would omit whales from this list, in spite of their enormous bodily mass, since they can only live in
water, protected and buoyed up by it. In water, they are virtually weightless, their weight – though of
course not their mass – being cancelled out by the counterpush of the water. In any case, they come
under Neptune’s dominion, both for their habitat and for the mystery (as far as we land-lubbers are
concerned) of their existence. Also, these, too, may live to great ages. But Neptune is even farther out
from the Sun, with a far longer year, than Saturn. If whales – barring accidents and whaling ships –
tend to live lives very much longer than ours, the length of the latter being ruled by Saturn, then the
longevity of whales would therefore naturally also be included under Neptune’s dominion. (We have
to ask: what would the astrology of whales be like, what Planets would they assign to the dominion of
themselves, which to human beings? Speaking of which, one wonders how the astrologies of all other
organisms would compare to that of any given human culture?)

‡In light of this, an interesting confirmation of Liber 777’s assignment of the animal ‘woman” to Key 3
(Liber 777, Column XXXVIII), which is also associated with Saturn, is the fact that, statistically
speaking, women do tend to live longer than men in cultures in which women are not usually worn to
death by childbearing at a relatively young age.

‡‡Noted by Yael R. Dragwyla.

Creatures in general:

Foods, drugs, flavors, and perfumes:

Liber 777:

Mineral drugs:

Key 32: lead, the chemical element (see above for more on which)*
Key 32-bis: bismuth, the chemical element (see above for more on which)*

Perfumes:

Key 32: Asafetida, scammony, indigo, and sulfur (all evil odors)**
Key 32-bis: storax and all dull and heavy odors**

Ivy Goldstein-Jacobson gives as foods or other ingestants associated with Saturn salt,
bitter herbs and roots, pickling, and dry wines.†
De Vore gives cold, sour, and astringent tastes.‡
The following are also associated with Saturn, either because their characteristics
correspond with those of Saturn or because they are Magickally linked to Saturn:
 Foods and ingestants: Anything sour or astringent; anything heavy in consistency;
those which are black or dark in color; well-aged foods, e.g., certain meats, fine wines, the
“thousand-year old” egg (a Chinese delicacy which, though not aged quite that long [!], is
aged for a considerable while, say, from a week to a year or several years, before ingestion);
angostura bitters and anything made from them; cinnamon, parsley, and endive, which are
bitter to the taste; licorice, which is bitter and black, and by extension anise and anything
else with a similar taste; olives (because of their color, and the fact that Saturnus is
supposed to have introduced olivaculture into Italy); blood pudding (color and substance);
garlic, A.K.A. moly (another gift of Saturnus); beer, as opposed to wine, and any barley dish
or product (ditto); cold foods, especially those which are not sweet and do not have a high
fat content; all frozen foods; those which are over-cooked or otherwise repellent to the taste.
Those made from the herbs and trees listed above; quinine, because of its bitter taste;
alkali earths and waters, because they are both bitter and poisonous; poisons and, by
reflection, their antidotes; homeopathic tinctures made from the Saturnian minerals, stones,
and plants listed above; wormwood; gall, a poison; Coca-Cola” and similar drinks – the
extract of the kola nut from which they are made is bitter, the color of such drinks is dark,
and the carbonated water with which they are made is alkaline; and coffee, which is dark
and in color and bitter in taste, and is as well a vasoconstrictor.
Also, any foods or drugs necessary to the production and maintenance of physiological
processes, tissues, organs and organ-systems ruled by Saturn, such as ossification, the
skeleton, etc., are ruled by Saturn. These include, e.g., vitamin C, sugars of calcium, and
vitamin D, which are necessary to the construction and maintenance of bones and teeth as
well as to the production of saliva, which, when it contains enough calcium, helps re-build
the teeth, replacing what has been worn away or damaged by various things.

*Liber 777, Column XLIV.

**Liber 777, Column XLII.

†Goldstein-Jacobson, op. cit., p. 44.

‡De Vore, op. cit., p. 281.

Clothing, Magickal Weapons, and other objects, phenomena, and processes:

According to de Vore, Saturn rules land, minerals, agriculture, and garden implements;
heavy materials; dull and heavy substances; and dross. §
Magickally, in the Hexagram Rituals, used in Planetary invocations, He rules the South
Quarter and the Southern portion of the altar, while in the Pentagram Rituals, used in
Elemental and Stellar invocations and rituals dedicated to the Zodiacal Signs, He rules the
Northern Quarter and the North side of the Altar. Traditionally, along with Mercury, He
rules books, and thus any books placed upon the Altar or used in Magickal ritual.
Qaballistically, He rules Assiah, the Material World, or World of the Senses.
According to the Old Roman religious stories, Saturnus invented agriculture, and gave it
to humankind. Therefore, by extension, Saturn rules implements used in agriculture or
gardening; and land, particularly that used for agriculture.** Probably as a derivation of
His traditional rulership of agricultural land, He also rules real estate, especially large,
utilitarian buildings such as office buildings, factories and warehouses; foundations,
especially of buildings, but also the foundation of the state (e.g., a constitution), a family or a
great financial reserve.
Saturn rules the mineral kingdom, and minerals of all kinds. Therefore He rules
mineralogy, instruments used in prospecting, mining equipment and mines, smelting,
metallurgy, and anything else connected with the search for, extraction of, and uses of all
kinds of minerals. In particular, He rules coal and coal mines, hence carbon; and therefore,
along with Pluto and Mars, diamonds, since these, like coal, are allotropic forms of carbon.
Saturn rules such basic physical phenomena and principles as mass, density, inertia, and
momentum. He therefore rules weight, and anything associated with it, such as scales and
weighing machines; heavy materials, such as ship’s canvas, sheet lead or metallic bullion;
and anything excessively heavy, dense, or having an intensely strong gravitational field, such
as neutronium (the material of which a neutron star is composed) or a Black Hole. In
association with these, He rules weights and yokes, and heavy vehicles such as trucks and
heavy carts.
He rules dull substances and dreary matters. Similarly, He rules blunt instruments,
hence hammers, cudgels and clubs.
He rules entropy, and thus dross and waste of all kinds. Therefore He rules scavenger
vehicles for collection of garbage and rubbish; rubbish-dumps and junkyards; ash-pits;
garbage cans; plumbing supplies and equipment; sewer-pipes; and anything else connected
with waste, its collection, and its storage.
Saturn rules ambition, and the hard work that achieves it. Therefore He rules labor of
all kinds, particularly heavy labor, and everything associated with it. This last would include
work clothes, e.g., overalls, and the cloth used to make it, such as denim, wool and serge;
and equipment used in hard labor, such as wheelbarrows, spades and shovels.
He rules satire and thus satirists, clowns and buffoons, therefore things associated with
them, such as clown costumes.
He rules boundaries and limits of all kinds, including territorial and national
boundaries, and thus fences, walls, barriers, and boundary-markers of whatever type. In
particular, in questions of morality, which come under His special provenance, He rules the
limits of socially or legally permissible conduct. For the same reason, He rules the skin,
which is the boundary or outer limit of the body, hence hides, leather, shells, and the armor
of some sea creatures and reptiles. Thus He rules things made from animal integuments,
such as leather shoes and belts. In general, He rules loss, limitation, restriction, frustration,
want, lack, hardship and privation in any form, because all these signify the constraints that
set the outer bounds of what we are able to achieve in life, for better or worse. he a corollary,
He rules anything that binds, such as rope, harnesses, hooks, ropes, cords and chains;
anything that smothers, such as feathers or blankets; and strangulation and choking, and
anything that causes them.
Saturn rules structure as a general phenomenon, and the things that determine structure,
resistance to change and permanence of form. Thus He rules anything that contains,
hardens, freezes or supports. He therefore rules the skeleton or internal structure of
anything, including the teeth, which give structure and form to the lower parts of the face
and shapeliness to the upper lip (as witness the caved-in appearance of the mouths of people
who have lost many of their teeth). Similarly, he rules extreme cold, and whatever protects
us from it. Thus He rules heavy overcoats, woolens, furs and, by extension, any sort of warm
shelter.
The fall of Satan (Saturn) from Heaven is the archetype of all falls, whether physical or
falls from grace or honor. Because of this, Saturn rules falls of all kinds, whether physical,
financial, moral or in terms of social status.
Saturn rules the State, and thus corporations, which are expressions of the State in
miniature. He rules the chief executive, and is therefore a significator of the father, the
chairman of the board and, in mundane charts, the administration. In line with this, He
rules discipline and its correlates, such as police, the father, the judge in a courtroom, prison
wardens, and all places of barred or caged detention, such as jails or animal cages.
Because Saturn rules limits of all kinds, He rules mortality and death, for these signify
the limits of our powers and the span of our days. Therefore classically Saturn rules
funerals, undertakers, stable equipment, hearses and funeral trains, mourning, cemeteries,
coffins, gravestones, and graves. He therefore rules executions, both because they involve
the ending of life and because these are instruments of State policy and sanction, also ruled
by Saturn. For these reasons He is nocturnally exalted in Scorpio. Similarly, Saturn rules
great old age and all the considerations and concerns associated with it.†
Finally, Saturn rules the “hard” sciences, dull studies and mathematics.†† He therefore
rules economics, the “dismal science,” an archetypally Saturnian discipline.‡
§
De Vore, op. cit., p. 286.

**Another way in which Saturn resembles Luna. Luna’s dominion includes landed property and real
estate, and the Fourth House of the horoscope, the its “ground,” the cusp of which is the Earth Point,
where the matter or person with which the chart is concerned is connected to the Earth.

†Though since Pluto’s discovery Saturn has had to share the rulership of funerary matters and all things
fearsome and fatal with the outermost Planet and its grim Lord.

††Strictly speaking, Neptune rules higher mathematics and the creative, “right-brain” aspects of
mathematical reasoning. Saturn is concerned more with arithmetic and other “left-brain” aspects of
mathematics.

‡Robert Malthus’ famous paper on population increase and its consequences is within the domain of
economics, which actually is one branch of human ecology. The conclusions which Malthus drew
concerning the inevitable results of excessive growth of human or any other population – famine,
plague, and bloody struggle for scarce resources, i.e., war – are as grim as anything out of a Stephen
King novel, and thus a perfect example of the Saturnian dominion of this field.

Anatomy and physiology:

Liber 777 gives the excretory system (Key 32); and excretory organs and the skeleton
(Key 32 bis). (Presumably the first refers primarily to the bowels, kidneys, and bladder, but
it could also include the sweat-glands and even the lungs and nasal passages. The first
kidney was the integument, and sweat-glands are organs of excretion as much as the bladder
and kidneys are, venting highly dilute urine and other wastes to the outer world in a process
which, just incidentally, also helps cool the body down. The lungs, nose, and associated
organs and tissues void waste gases to the air that would otherwise poison the body, so they,
too, function as excretory organs.)
Traditionally Saturn rules any part of the body that protects, supports or arms the
organism against attack, such as the skin, bones, cartilage, teeth, joints, ligaments, knees,
the calf of the leg, spleen, and organs of hearing,* and such physiological processes as
ossification (bone-building), congestion, and the proper functioning of the tendons and
cartilage. He rules as well the senses of touch and sensitivity to pressure.** Finally, He rules
the back, spine and spinal cord – at least as much for the trouble these give as for their
structural, support and related functions.
De Vore gives the medullary portion of the adrenal gland; the “secretive system” (the
excretory and/or reproductive systems?); teeth, bones, joints, and tendons, particularly f the
knee and the calf of the leg; the spleen; and the organs and sense of hearing.†
By extension of the foregoing, Saturn rules horns, claws, quills, feathers, fur, scales,
shagreen (shark-skin), thorns, spines, chitin (the exoskeleton of an insect), the muscular
system of mollusks (which also functions as an internal-support system, to some extent),
hooves and calluses. Therefore Saturn rules the metabolism necessary to their development
and maintenance, including the Krebs cycle, which powers the metabolism of the eukaryotic
cell, and anything using or producing vitamin C, which is absolutely necessary to the
maintenance of that cycle, without which the metabolism of multicellular organisms can’t
function.
Saturn rules ossification of the bones and teeth, and the metabolism of calcium and its
turnover in the body. Therefore He rules the parathyroid glands, which mediate the calcium
metabolism, and the salivary glands, which continuously bathe the mouth with the calcium
shunted to them from the parathyroid glands via the bloodstream, a process necessary for the
maintenance of strong and healthy teeth.
 Finally, Saturn rules the dynamic process of homeostasis, by which the various
biochemical and physical parameters of the body’s functions, such as temperature,
chemically-driven aspects of the appetites and pH level, are maintained within the limits that
support life.

*Among other considerations, the inner ear of vertebrates, including human beings, contains small bones
– the well-known “anvil,” “stirrup,” and “hammer” – which mediate hearing by acting as
transformers of sonic energy entering the ear into nerve pulses the brain can interpret as auditory
perception. These bones are surrounded by liquid, through which the pulses induced in these tiny
bones by sound energy are transmitted to nerves lining the auditory canal, stimulating them to fire.
Their impulses in turn go to the auditory cortex, where they are translated into auditory perceptions.
The little bones involved in this originally evolved from the jaw-bones of earlier vertebrates that lived
long ago. This whole evolutionary process, by the way, both because of the time it took and the
scientific methods needed to piece together our understanding of it, is also ruled by Saturn.

**This is another reason for Saturn’s dominion over the organs and senses of hearing. In terms of
process and function, these evolved from the sense of touch and the organism’s response to sensations
of pressure from external stimuli.

†De Vore, op. cit., p. 280.

Psychology:

Typical psychological traits and tendencies ruled by Saturn include asceticism;

patience; prudence; ambition; commitment; self-discipline; concrete thinking (as opposed
to abstraction and generalization, which are Jovian functions); pragmatism; laconic
expression; secretiveness; caution; inhibition; reserve; miserliness; anal-retentiveness; a
serious outlook on life; authoritarianism; Puritanism; and entrenched vengefulness.
Saturn rules such faculties and abilities as the ability to think in concrete terms and
create things with real substance to them; concentration, particularly the ability to focus the
Will strongly, and that which is involved in fulfilling it; the practical ability to make ideas
manifest in concrete form; inclinations toward and talent for scientific research, especially
mathematics; inventiveness in the service of the creation of labor-saving devices; a long
memory for injuries and torts; and ingenuity in taking revenge.
Saturnian emotions and reactions include fear (hence in the proper context, Saturn may
become an omen of paranoia); despair; aversion; disgust; frustration; and cold rage.
Typically Saturnian personality structures include a well-ordered mind that has a gift for
the technical and the concrete, with an emphasis on detail; the conservative realist, who
asserts the authority of experience; noncommittal, noncommunicative traits; the purist or
puritan; an apostle of justice meted out with firmness, fairness and impartiality, developing
out of a strong sense of justice and a hatred of injustice; a slave to custom and convention,
even when inveighing against conformity; faithfulness combined with jealousy; a resistance
to being easily offended; a tendency to separation and isolation, due to strong geocentricism,
introversion, and inability to express affections outwardly; a tendency to learn everything
the hard way; a strong sense of self-preservation; an aversion toward hard work developed
as a result of having too much of it to do; a tendency to hold emotions in check through the
exercise of will-power and thought; a temperament that is cold, slow and deliberate, but
inexorable when fully aroused; the schemer who plots his way to positions of authority,
wherein he discharges his duties with tyrannical conservatism; the reactionary who is
nevertheless dependable, loyal and faithful; the arch-conservative; and the dictatorial or
tyrannical temperament.

Diseases:

Liber 777 gives arteriosclerosis (Key 32); and sluggishness (Key 32 bis).
 Typically Saturnian pathologies include anything due to His restrictive, hardening,
obstructive influences on the psyche and the spirit as well as on the body. Astrologically, He
denotes stricture and obstruction in the parts of the body signified by the Sign which He
occupies. He rules pathological ossification of parts of the body, including gall-stones,
kidney- and bladder- stones, rheumatism, arthritis in all its forms, and arteriosclerosis. At
the opposite pole, He rules pathologies due to failure to ossify of parts that normally do so,
such as osteoporosis and decalcification of the bones or teeth, or conditions in which the
bones, teeth and other parts of the body cannot assimilate or retain calcium necessary to their
structure and/or metabolism; decayed and abscessed teeth; and malfunction of the
parathyroid glands and the calcium metabolism that lead to problems of this sort. He rules
anything that adversely affects the integrity or functioning of the skin or its nerves, including
conditions ranging from acne to leprosy as well as serious trauma such as extensive
abrasions and burns. He rules the gall-bladder and its functions, and therefore bilious
disorders, jaundice, colic and gout, all the result of blockage (Saturn) of liver-function and
consequent pathologies due to the joint, synergistic malfunctions of both liver and gall-
bladder. He rules the back and the spine, and therefore any kinds of disorder affecting the
back, spine, or individual vertebrae. He rules anything adversely affecting the spleen or its
functioning.
Since Saturn rules poisons of all kinds, He therefore rules general poisoning or toxicity
of the body or of its parts, and pathologies due to it, including malignant tumors of all kinds,
particularly cancer of the colon. Other physical pathologies coming under Saturn’s rule
include injuries, illness or other dysfunctions due to falls or subnormal temperatures, such as
broken bones or frostbite; malnutrition (when this is a result of miserliness or some other
pathological personality trait or general personality disorder, it could be classified as one of
Saturn’s psychogenic pathologies); skin diseases; atrophy of any part; crippling of any kind
(since it restricts one’s mobility and functioning according to its nature and extent);
maiming of any pert, such as that due to an amputation; gangrene, when this is due to
impaired circulation; myasthenia gravis (a condition of muscular atrophy, which seems to
have a genetic component or determinant, such that the victim is not able to sustain his or
her own weight, or to move, against the force of gravity); constipation; and diverticulosis of
the upper or lower bowels (a condition in which the inner surface of the bowel becomes
covered with pockets of waste matter, leading to suppuration of its tissues and, eventually, if
the condition is not corrected in time, a potentially lethal peritonitis).* Finally, because
Saturn rules cold and cooling, He is associated with poikilothermia, a pathological condition
of warm-blooded animals such as mammals and birds in which the body cannot maintain a
constant temperature through internal mechanisms, but rather has a temperature
proportional to that of its immediate environment.**
Neurological disorders associated with Saturn include various forms of brain-damage
(since Saturn rules anything which restricts or inhibits function); epithelial numbness;
spinal ailments of all kinds; conditions of hypersensitivity and psychoneurotic fragility due
to insufficient dietary calcium, or inability of the central nervous system to assimilate, retain,
or utilize calcium in its physiology, from whatever cause; all neuralgias, particularly those
characterized as chronic, heavy, dull, or grinding pain; the developmental disabilities
known as mental retardation and mongolism (Down’s syndrome); and the neurological
pathologies grouped under the heading of “aphasia,” because of Saturn’s rulership of silence
in all forms and expressions.
The Saturnian pathologies of the senses include diseases of the inner ear and all forms
of deafness; tunnel-vision and blindness in all its forms; and in general, any sensory
dysfunction, since such a condition cuts one off from the external world. These may be
primarily physical, physiological or neurological in origin; or they may be the result of
psychosomatic or psychogenic factors.
Psychological pathologies due to Saturnian influences would include melancholia;
hypochondria; obsessive-compulsive disorders of a Saturnian nature, such as obsessive
cleanliness, compulsive hand-washing, counting manias, and so forth; emotional numbing;
chronic despair or depression; phobias of all kinds, particularly those which cripple one’s
ability to go out into the world and interact with it fully (although when these are due to
neurological rather than purely or primarily psychological causes, these are better
categorized among the neurological disorders ruled by Saturn); entrenched and chronic
 suspiciousness and paranoia; extreme or chronic jealousy, and the pathologies of rage
associated with it; and psychoses due to breakdown of the psyche under stresses too great
for its capacity; exclusively concrete thinking, that is, inability to form abstract ideas and
generalizations.
Psychosomatic or psychogenic problems of S8turniw origin would include “first-year
medical-student syndrome,” i.e., a strong tendency to hypochondria, coupled with a great
deal of reading up on medical subjects, resulting in an inevitable ascription to even the most
minor, transient or ordinary aches, pains, itches, rashes and other conditions the most
hideous and rare of the afflictions discovered in such reading; inhibited functioning due to
fears and morbid conditions; depressed metabolism or impaired circulation due to inhibited
emotions; and anorexia nervosa (self-starvation for the sake of “slenderness”; it is not clear
whether such a condition is due primarily to psychological, neurological or endocrinological
problems).

*Ironically, this condition is easily prevented by daily inclusion in the diet of plenty of high-fiber foods,
such as bran, crunchy vegetables such as celery and lettuce, nuts, and seeds. Because of their fibrous,
highly articulated microstructure and their firm texture, such foods could also be said to be ruled by
Saturn.

**H. P. Lovecraft, a writer of horror whose works are governed by all the Outer Planets, especially Saturn,
suffered for most of his life from this condition.

Magickal image: An hermaphrodite dancing in a circle formed by the Four Living Creatures at
the Throne of God of the Apocalypse

Forms, shapes, lineal figures, geomantic figures, figures related to pure number, numerological
associations, and other mathematical entities:

Liber 777:

Key 32: The Triangle*

Key 32-bis: all geomantic figures belonging to the Earthy Triplicity of
astrological Signs.*

De Vore gives cramped forms, straight short lines, and sharp, clear-cut outlines as being
under Saturn’s dominion.**
Traditionally, triangles are associated with Saturn because they are the strongest
geometric figure (as long as a triangle’s sides are intact, you can’t deform the figure by
pushing on a side the way you can with quadrilaterals). Rectangles, squares, rhombuses,
cubes, hypercubes, and other figures with straight edges that meet at right angles are
associated with Saturn.
In general, cramped forms, straight short lines, and sharp, clear-cut outlines are
associated with Saturn.
Numerologically speaking, the Key Numbers associated with Saturn are 3 (Binah), 10
(Malkuth), and 32 (Tav). In turn, the Mystic Numbers of the Paths associated with these
numbers are respectively 1 + 2 + 3 = 6, 1 + 2 + . . . + 10 = 55, and 1 + 2 + . . . + 32 = 528.
Also, the sum of the letters of BINH (Binah) = 2 + 10 + 60 + 5 = 77; those of ‫תוכלם‬
(Malkuth) = 40 + 30 + 20 + 6 + 400 = 496; and those of ‫( ות‬Tav) = 400 + 6 = 406.

*Liber 777, Column XLIX.

**De Vore, op. cit., p. 281.

Magick Square:

The 3 x 3 Magick Square traditionally associated with Saturn, used to make Sigils for
Saturnian amulets and talismans, is as follows:

4 9 2
3 5 7
8 1 6

The Hexagram:

Liber 777: Key 32: the Top Point of the Hexagram

The Pentagram:

Liber 777: Key 32-bis: the Left Lower Point of the Pentagram

Domain:

Quarter: Saturn rules the southern quarter.

Buddhist symbolism:

Occupations, businesses, employment, and ecological niches:

Saturn rules all construction trades, specifically architects, manual laborers, bricklayers,
masons, plumbers, and bridge builders; real-estate brokers; bankers and stockbrokers;
farmers, gardeners, and agriculturists; green-grocers; night watchmen; those whose
employment has to do with death and dying, including managers of cemeteries, morticians,
coroners, undertakers, and those in mourning; clock- and watch-makers; and, in general,
those who make, repair or do maintenance upon timepieces of any sort; hermits, monks, and
recluses; mountain-climbers; miners, particularly coal-miners; beggars, hobos, paupers,
and tramps; clowns, comedians and satirists; prudent counselors; herdsmen; those in
authority; civil servants, including minor state executives and law-enforcement authorities;
mathematicians; economists; widows and widowers; ascetics of all kinds, religious and
otherwise; geologists, geographers, paleontologists, archeologists, antiquarians;
gerontologists and those who work with the elderly in any way; cryologists; cryogenic
researchers and technicians; those who make, repair or maintain refrigeration equipment of
any kind; mayors; misers; those who fast or starve; older people; prison wardens, zoo-
keepers, and any others who tend those kept in cages; executioners and other official
instruments of punishment of the state; all forms of secular authority, particularly those in
positions of executive leadership; bureaucrats and bureaucracies; dentists, dermatologists,
osteopaths, chiropractors, osteologists, hearing specialists; and physicians with specialties
involving weight-reduction as well as those who deal with eating disorders such as anorexia
nervosa, bulimia and extreme obesity due to compulsive overeating.
In terms of general biology, Saturn rules the little fish that swim into the mouths of
sharks (who hold their mouths open and refrain from biting the little fish who are about to
do them a favor) to eat up any bits of food or parasites that are lodged there and could
otherwise cause illness or irritation in the shark; jackals, scavenger beetles, vultures,
condors, buzzards, fungi, and microscopic organisms which are involved in putrescence and
the rotting of animal-tissue, all of which are involved in disposal and recycling of dead
 organisms and tissues; termites, beavers and other organisms that engage in building
various types of solid, semi-permanent structures; ants and squirrels, which put by hoards
for the winter (also, certain species of ants are agriculturists, keeping pasturage for the
aphids which they ranch for their sweet “milk”); and organisms which are solitary by
nature.

Places, nations, and peoples:

Saturn rules places of labor, usually hard to reach, unpleasant to find or to smell, such as
pig-sties, cow-barns, and chicken-houses.
Saturn rules places of caged, walled-in or barred detention and confinement, including
zoos, terraria, dungeons, jails, prisons, and hospitals for the criminally insane; and places of
torture, inquisition, and execution. Similarly, He rules fences, walls, barriers, and anything
else that confines or encloses, as well as all pieces weighed down by stones or covered by
heavy overgrowth; and the surfaces of high-gravity Planets and neutron Stars, as well as the
ergospheres of black holes.
He rules monks and recluses, and therefore monasteries and similar places of retreat.
He rules all places having to do with death and dying, such as coroners’ offices and
laboratories, cemeteries, mortuaries, churchyards (when these are used as cemeteries), and
graves.
He rules all places of sadness, melancholy, solitude, and desertion, such as ruins, lonely
haunts, lairs, dens, stone-quarries, gravel-pits, deserted cities, dark caves and caverns, great
underground cave-systems, dark recesses of all kinds, and any wild, open, uncultivated and
lonely region.
He rules places associated with abandoned or useless goods, pollution, waste, and
devastation, such as junkyards, dung-heaps, rubbish-dumps, strip mines, toxic-waste dumps,
sewage outfalls, burned-out homes and other buildings, areas devastated by war, artillery
ranges, and places where nuclear or thermonuclear devices have been tested.
He rules weight-reduction salons, “fat farms,” and clinics that treat eating
disorders.
He rules all straits, isthmuses, and places of hard passage.
He rules chimney-sweepers, partly because of the color of the soot that covers them,
partly because their work is so hard. Also, chimney soot contains carcinogens, due to which
chimney-sweepers often die of prostate cancer, a disease of toxicity and thus one ruled by
Saturn.
He rules extremely cold places, such as cold-lockers, refrigerators, cryology laboratories,
cryogenic storage facilities, regions such as Antarctica, and the surface of Planets far from
the warmth and light of Sol. Inasmuch as Saturn is also the Lord of Earth, both the Element
and our terrestrial sphere, He rules things at or below ground-level, close to the floor or on
the first floor of a building, on stone or gravel or cemented ground in the open. Thus He
rules cellars, ground-floor dwellings, and homes or storage-places built into the sides of
mountains or hills. Because of His rulership of Earth, He is Lord of the Mineral kingdom,
and thus He rules mines and coal-pits; similarly, He rules the basic structures of terrestrial
geography, such as mountainous or hilly regions; mountain-ranges; rocky countryside and
accumulations of rock; and land-surfaces, land-forms, and the continents of the Earth in
general. He also rules anything in the Southern Quarter.
Concerning lands and nations ruled by Saturn, traditionally India and her people come
under His dominion.* So does the isle of Capri in the Bay of Naples, which was probably
originally named for its population of goats. Also, the Soviet Union was ruled by Saturn and
the Saturnian aspects of Aquarius. (The flag of the Soviet Union had as a prominently
displayed device the hammer-and-sickle. The sickle is the emblem of Saturn, very
appropriate for this Saturnian supranational coalition.**)

*Watters, op. cit., p. 49.

**As of December 25, 1991 e.v. [87 a.n.], the Soviet Union was official dissolved by order of Boris
Yeltsin. By then, the former member-states of the Soviet Union had almost all gained recognition as
sovereign member-nations of the United Nations. Incidentally, this occurred under a set of
astrological transits including, among other things, a mutual reception between Uranus [radical
change, the new]; in Capricorn [government] and Saturn [endings, permanence, old things,
conservatism] in Aquarius [newness, Aeon of Horus, revolution].

Matters of the horoscope:

Saturn rules accountability, responsibility; achievement, ambition, attainment;

administrators, authority figures, bosses, chief executive, elders (as authorities), employers,
executives, the father (as authority figure), foremen, governing authority, government,
governors, managers, officials, official business, police, positions of authority or
responsibility, rulers, superiors, supervisors; adversary, opponent; agriculture, agronomy,
gardening; ailments (chronic); air-conditioning, refrigeration, cold of any degree,
particularly in the extreme, frigidity; ancestors; anachronisms, atavisms, throwbacks;
ancient matters; antiques; anxiety, brooding, cruelty, depression, despair, disheartenment,
fear, frustration, grief, hatred (chronic), malice, melancholy, pessimism, rage (chronic,
cold), sadism, sorrow, vengefulness, worry; archeology, artifacts (of which Saturn is only
the secondary ruler; the primary ruler of these is Pluto), history; arthritis, colds, deafness,
dental problems, pain (chronic, dull, heavy), tooth-ache; artificial (false) teeth and dentures,
hearing aids; bankruptcy; barriers, boundaries, constraints, delays, hindrances, limiting
conditions, limits, obstacles, obstructions, restrictions, straits, strictures; basalt, granite,
rock; basements; begging, poverty; bereavement, burial, carrion, casualties, cemeteries,
corpses, death, fatalities, funerals, mortality, mourning; bindings, compression; black
Magick, necromancy, sorcery; blackness, darkness; bluntness, dullness; bondage; bones,
skeleton, skin, spleen, teeth; books (Saturn is the co-ruler of books; Mercury is their primary
astrological ruler); bricks, ceramics, concrete, wooden beams; builders; business and
businessmen; calamities, catastrophes, disasters, doom, tragedies; chiropractic; calendars;
care, caution, concern, prudence; choking (Saturn is the secondary ruler; Mercury is the
primary one); chronic conditions of all kinds; clocks; clowns, comedians, satirists;
comedy, lampoon, satire; coal, coal-mines; cold, and anything associated with it;
concentration; conservation; conservatism, reactionary politics; constipation; corporations;
coughing; cryogenesis, cryology, cryologic storage and processing of the newly dead;
customs, laws, propriety, social mores, traditions; damnation; danger; decay, dissipation of
energy, entropy, pollution, waste; debts, mortgages; defeat, deprivation, disadvantage,
hardship, lack, loss, misfortune, privation, want; defects; the Democratic Party of American
politics; despots, dictators, tyrants; diets (Saturn co-rules this with Mercury and the 6th
House); discipline; dishonor, falls from position; doors, foundations of buildings, stairs,
stairways; duty, obligation; Earth, the Element; earth, as soil or rocky strata of Earth’s
surface, and everything and everyone connected with these; ecocatastrophe, ecology,
environmental awareness, environmental concerns, environmental deterioration; economics,
the economy; elderly people, geriatric diseases, senility; endurance, stamina; eternity;
executions, particularly crucifixions; form, structure, structures of any kind; geography,
geology; goats; gravity, mass, matter, weights; guardians; hard labor, hard work;
hardening; health (poor); hoarding, miserliness; honor, integrity; impotence, sexual
sterilization (Saturn is the secondary ruler of both of these; the primary ones are respectively
Neptune and Mars); inhibitions, neuroses; Jesuits; judgment (of others); justice; labor;
land; lead (the metal); leather, leather goods, leather merchants; learnedness, learning,
learning the hard way, scholars, scholarliness, scientists (especially in the hard sciences,
such as physics); longevity; looting, piracy, plundering; lower levels of anything;
malignancies; mathematics; minerals, ores; morality, the superego; the mother;* offices;
order, orderliness, organizational ability, organizations; orthodoxy; perseverance; poisons,
toxicity, toxins; pragmatism; profundity; Puritanism; real estate; reality principle;
relationships (stable, committed); repulsion; reserve, reticence, seriousness, solemnity;
retardation, including the disability of mental retardation but also any slowing-down of
process of any kind; retirement; secrets, silence; security, and the drive to achieve it (the
rulership of this is shared with Luna); selfishness; shrewdness; skin; sloth; slow-downs,
slowness; social position, standing, status; stocks, stockholders, stockbrokerages, Wall
Street; strangulation, suffocation; solitude; stability, stabilizing influences, stasis, static
conditions; teachers (Saturn is the co-ruler; Mercury is the primary ruler of elementary-
school teachers, and Jupiter of professors and educators concerned with higher education);
temptation, the tempter; testers, tests, tribulations, trials; time; trees (large); unused areas;
utilities (basic services); wisdom gained from experience; wooden structures (large),
wooden things in general; work of any kind (Saturn shares this domain with Mercury and
the 6th House); and work commonly avoided, particularly that usually delegated to those
low in socioeconomic status (especially that is performed only by outcastes and pariahs, e.g.,
handling of sewage, garbage, and corpses by the Untouchables of India).
To these, De Vore adds “the ultimate uncombined atomic condition of matter” (sub-
atomic particles such as quarks?); old plans and matters already begun; good advice; aged
and conservative or indigent friends, and relatives or others known to the querent. He also
gives restrictions, delay, poverty, defects, darkness, decay, the father (though numerous
authorities ascribe the mother to Saturn’s dominion); stability in friendships; secrets,
misfortune, sorrows, fatalities; the state of matter called “earth” (solids?), and those whose
occupations are concerned with it; ascetics, whether religious or otherwise; hermits, misers,
and those who fast or starve; workers employed by municipalities or the State; older people;
old plans, matters already started; debts and their payment; karma; practicality; good
advice; widows and widowers; mountainous and hilly places, and open country, especially
rocky and uncultivated; caves, ruins; corpses, graves, and churchyards. In horary astrology,
he gives persons who, because of their narrowness of outlook, endanger the success of the
Querent; aged and conservative or indigent friends or relatives; day laborers, religious
recluses, those engaged in agriculture or mining, paupers, beggars, clowns; sometimes
prudent counselors; and persons with ulterior motives (when Saturn is unfavorably
aspected). In mundane astrology, he gives minor state executives and law enforcement
authorities; civil service employees; land owners and mine operators; elderly persons;
public buildings, national calamities, scarcities.**
Barbara Watters gives limitation; frustration; want, lack, hardship, privation;
boundaries, the outer limits of property and, in mundane charts, nations, and in questions of
morality, the limits of socially or legally permissible conduct; loss; real estate, especially
large, utilitarian buildings such as offices, factories, and warehouses; foundations, especially
of buildings, but if the interpretation of the chart demands it, it can also signify the
foundation of a State (e.g., the US Constitution), a family or lineage (the patriarch or
founder), or a great financial reserve (e.g., the Ford Foundation); skeletons and all things
made from them;† teeth and armor;†† skin, the boundary or outer limits of the body, hence
animal skin, hides, leather, and shells, which are the armor of some sea creatures and
reptiles; whatever binds, such as rope, cord, or chains (mustn’t forget Duck Tape, that old
favorite among dungeon-masters and serial killers, or Scotch tape!)‡‡; whatever smothers,
such as feathers or blankets; strangulation, choking; falls, both physical and falls from
power (or from grace, such as Satan’s fall from heaven)‡‡; ambition, and the hard work
that achieves it; fear, hence Saturn in its proper context may signify paranoia; extreme cold
and whatever protects one from it, such as woolens, hats, or furs; the metal lead, and things
made from it; corporations (these are also ruled by Mars, Pluto, Scorpio, and the 8 th House
of the horoscope, hence Saturn’s exaltation in that house and sign, in addition to its
exaltation in Libra) ‡‡; the chief executive, hence the father (according to some authorities,
the mother)‡‡, the chairman of the board, and, in mundane work, political administrations;
discipline, and whoever enforces it, such as police, the father, the “long arm of the law,” the
judge in a courtroom, the warden in a prison; funerals and what pertains to them, such as
mourning, hearses, undertakers, cemeteries, or coffins; coal, coal mines, and miners (and,
presumably, mine-damp, i.e., the methane gas that frequently seeps out of seams of coal
which can asphyxiate miners or cause a vast explosion in a mine that kills numerous miners
and heavily damages or destroys the mine in which it occurs)‡‡; carbon, hence diamonds
(because of the blackness of the more common forms of solid carbon, i.e., coal, soot, and
graphite)‡‡; very old people and things; puritans and puritanism; goats; blunt
 instruments, hence hammers, cudgels, and clubs; the reward or punishment due to one’s
merits or misdeeds (she cites karma, as well, but karma actually refers only to consequences
of one’s actions, which, good or bad, can be morally neutral and often are – and, because
the universe doesn’t particularly play fair, and uncertainty is built into it, bad things do
frequently happen to good people, so the use of the term “karma” can be counterfactual )‡‡;
and time; weight, weighing machines, or anything excessively heavy.‡

*Many authorities accord the rulership of the mother to Luna, and that of the father to Saturn, because, in
our still rather patriarchal culture, the father is usually the official family authority-figure. But others
assert that Jupiter rules the father, and Saturn the mother, for the following reasons. First, the mother
is usually the first one whom the child experiences as restricting its freedom, or denying its needs or
wants. (a Saturnian experience), while the father provides some relief from this (Jupiter). Second, the
progressed Moon and transiting Saturn move through the horoscope at about the same angular
velocity, an average of 12-15 degrees per year, so that whatever one of them rules, ever one rules, the
other could be considered to do so as well – so that because Luna rules the mother, Saturn does so as
well. In this context, it is also of interest that “mother,” “matter,” and “matrix” come from the same
Indo-European linguistic root; Saturn of course rules matter as a phenomenon, while “matrix” is
related in meaning to ‘“structure,” which is also ruled by Saturn. Finally, Saturn rules containers and
shields. The womb, the child’s first home, is exactly that, a life-support system for the developing
fetus. These aspects of gestation and motherhood are archetypally Saturnian, one of Saturn’s most
positive functions, one more reason to ascribe “the mother” to Saturn’s dominion.

**De Vore, op. cit., pp. 297, 298, 299.

†This should include not only vertebrate skeletons, the bones of creatures with backbones, but also the
exoskeletons of invertebrates and the internal scaffolding that forms support structures within cells.

††Which includes both natural and artificial armor, the latter including, e.g., chain-link mail, Kevlar
armor, leather armor, etc.

‡Watters, op. cit., pp. 48-49.

‡‡Comments in italics by Yael R. Dragwyla, author of this work.

Music:

Any dark and/or definitely articulated piece of music is ruled by Saturn. Johann
Sebastian Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor is an excellent example of this. Heavy
and/or depressing music, such as the legendary Hungarian popular piece “Blue Sunday,”* is
exemplary.
Other examples of Saturnian music include the following:

Chopin’s Funeral March

Mussorgski’s Night on Bald Mountain
Tom Lehrer’s satirical songs
Berlioz’s Symphony Fantastique
“Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age,” in Gustav Holst’s The Planets
Verdi’s Requiem Mass
Mozart’s Requiem Mass
Ralph Vaughan William’s Sinfonia Antarctica.
“Sunrise, Sunset,” by Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock, from the musical Fiddler on
the Roof (copyright 1964 by the New York Times Music Corporation).
“Gimme Dat Ol’ Time Religion!” This filk-song (i.e., a folk-song beloved of science-fiction, has
been a favorite of science-fiction fans for generations – er, well, at least a few computer
generations, maybe. At any rate, it has about ten Godzillion verses to it, with googolzillions
more spawned at every science-fiction convention, fan-club meeting, holiday party, tupperware
party, and any other possible excuse for s-f fans to get together and throw off, for a time, any
illusions that they really are normal denizens of this (or any other) Planet. Most of these verses
are not suitable for publication in a family magazine, however, while the author hasn’t run across
too many others, so only a few are included here (the aspiring student is encouraged to think up
as many new ones as possible – prizes will be awarded, please send all your creations to the
author, who plans to get rich off a party-album with them. But seriously, folks . . .) But clearly,
from the verses and chorus given here, this song is definitely concerned with (a) very old things,
matters, concerns, Gods, people, etc.; (b) critiquing attitudes of various sorts; (c) tickling your
funny bone. As Saturn is concerned with all such matters, this is an excellent song for
invocation of Saturn. Some of the verses (at last count, there were over a hundred, many of them
not printable here) include:

O–
It was good enough for Isis,
Who will help us in a crisis;
And She’s never raised Her prices –
So it’s good enough for me!

Chorus

It was good enough for Dagon,

That conservative old pagan,
Who still votes for Ronald Reagan
So it’s good enough for me!

Chorus

It was good enough for Eris,

The Goddess of Chaos and Discord,
Which is why this line neither rhymes nor scans –
So it’s good enough for me!

Chorus

It was good enough for “Bob” Dobbs.

With the hoi polloi he hobnobs –
And he even likes to get down with us slobs –
So it’s good enough for me!

Chorus

It was good for Nyarlathotep,

The Starry Wisdom Cult’s Head Rep;
To sci-fi cons he loves to schlepp –
So it’s good enough for me!

Chorus:
Gimme dat ol’ time religion,
Gimme dat ol’ time religion,
Gimme dat ol’ time religion –
It’s good enough for me!
*Allegedly, every time this piece of music is played over the radio, the rate of suicides that take place in
the cities where the stations playing it are widely listened to, especially suicides of young people, goes
sky-high.

Poetry:

“My Last Duchess,” by Robert Browning (1812-1889) is a poem that induces a

gradually growing horror in the reader and listener as it is made clearer and clearer just what
the attitude of the speaker is to his last duchess . . . and her likely fate. Saturn rules the
tyrant, the oppressor, the man or woman who must have control – or at least its illusion –
over everything in his or her life at any cost . . . including murder. Thus this is an
outstanding invocatory poem of Saturn.
“Yule Horror,” by Howard Phillips Lovecraft (included in the collection of his poetry
Fungi from Yuggoth [New York: Ballantine Books, 1971], pp. 85-86) conjures up hideous
cold, a lowering oppressiveness, eldritch rituals, people from out of the dim misty dawn of
Time,, sickness, darkness, ending in three superb, short verses. It is one of the best
invocatory poems for Saturn I have ever found.
“Hymn to Pan,” by Aleister Crowley
“The Master of Time,” by Jan van Nijlen
“A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” by Martin Luther. “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God”
(German, Ein’ feste Burg ist unser Gott) is the best known of Martin Luther’s hymns. Luther
wrote the words and composed the melody sometime between 1527 and 1529. It has been
translated into English at least seventy times and also into many other languages. The words
are a paraphrase of Psalm 46.
“The Wild Old Wicked Man,” by William Butler Yeats (1938)
“Rock of Ages,” a popular Christian hymn by Reverend Augustus Montague Toplady
written in 1763 and first published in The Gospel Magazine in 1775.
“This Ole House” by Stuart Hamblen (copyright 1954 by Hamblen Music Company),
was written by Hamblen while he was on a hunting trip in the Sierra Nevada in California,
where he stumbled on a remote prospector’s shack. The old miner lay dead inside, but his
loyal dog, despite the severe weather and near starvation, was still guarding the premises.
Hamblen said that he wrote this song as the old prospector’s epitaph.

This ole house once knew my children;

This ole house once knew my wife;
This ole house was home and comfort
As we fought the storms of life.
This ole house once rang with laughter;
This ole house heard many shouts;
Now she trembles in the darkness
When the lightnin’ walks about.

Chorus:
Ain’t a-gonna need this house no longer,
Ain’t a-gonna need this house no more.
Ain’t got time to fix the shingles,
Ain’t got time to fix the floor,
Ain’t got time to oil the hinges
Nor to mend the window-pane,
Ain’t a gonna need this house no longer;
I’m a gettin’ ready to meet the saints.

This ole house is a gettin’ shaky;

 This ole house is a gettin’ old;
This ole house lets in the rain;
This ole house lets in the cold.
On my knees I’m gettin’ chilly,
But I fear no fear nor pain,
‘Cause I see an angel peekin’
Through a broken window-pane.
Chorus:

This ole house is afraid of thunder;

This ole house is afraid of storms;
This ole house just groans and trembles
When the night wind flings its arms.
This ole house is gettin’ feeble;
This ole house is needin’ paint.
Just like me it’s tuckered out,
But I’m a gettin’ ready to meet the saints.
Chorus:

This ole hound dog lies a-sleepin’;

He don’t know I’m gonna leave;
Else he’d wake up by the fireplace,
And he’d sit there and howl and grieve.
But my huntin’ days are over,
Ain’t gonna hunt the coon no more.
Gabriel done brought in my chariot
When the wind blew down the door.
Chorus:

“Stand by Me,” by Ben E. King, Mike Stoller and Jerry Leiber (copyright 1961 by
Progressive Music Publishing Co.).
“A Christmas Carol,” by Tom Lehrer (in his Too Many Songs by Tom Lehrer with Not
Enough Drawings by Ronald Searle [New York: Pantheon Books, 1981], pp. 60-62, 150-
151; and on his record album An Evening Wasted With Tom Lehrer [1959]).
Chorale from Mozart’s Requiem Mass. This, the great Mass of Death and Judgment,
with all its imagery of Judgment Day, is a perfect chorale hymn of Saturn in His Aspects of
the Just Judge of Libra and the Executioner of Scorpio.
“Alice’s Restaurant Massacree,” Arlo Guthrie
“The Motorcycle (Significance of the Pickle) Song,” by Arlo Guthrie
“Wasted Youth” and “Objects in the Rear-View Mirror May Appear Closer Than They
Are,” from the album Bat Out of Hell II released in 1993; both songs performed by Meatloaf
(Marvin Lee Aday), and composed and written by Jim Steinman*

*To some extent, given their overall themes, all of Meatloaf’s Bat Out of Hell studio albums – Bat Out of
Hell, released in October 1977; Bat Out of Hell II: Back Into Hell, released in 1993; and Bat Out of
Hell III: The Monster is Loose (2006) are associated with Saturn.

Graphic works of art:

Goya’s The Crucifixion

 Hieronymus Bosch’s The Temptations of St. Anthony; The Haywain Tryptych; The
Garden of Earthly Delights, especially the Hell panel; The Seven Deadly Sins and the Last
Four Things
Veronese’s Golgotha
Dali’s Vision of St. John
the collected cartoons of Charles Addams; the illustrations of Edward Gorey.

Books, periodicals, and other literary productions:

Anything by Edward Gorey

Jessica Mitford, The American Way of Death
Dante Alighieri, The Inferno
Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Prince
The works of H. P. Lovecraft; in particular, his novel At the Mountains of Madness,
because it is set in Antarctica.
Almost anything by Olaf Stapledon (appropriately enough, several of his longest works
were collected into an anthology titled To the End of Time
Eddings’s The Worm Ouroboros
Robert B. Thomas’s The Old Farmer’s Almanac (for a variety of reasons, not the least of
which is the fact .that an edition of it has come out faithfully every single year since 1792
e.v., when it was first published)
Stephen Hawking’s A Short History of Time.*
The CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics (you can win any argument in the world
by hitting your opponent a good lick or two upside the head with it at a judicious moment.
The Encyclopedia Brittanica (both for its scholarly completeness and for the same
reason given for the previous entry)
Solzhnetzin’s Gulag, set in Stalinist Russia
R. R, McCammon, Swan Song
Trevor Hoyle, The Last Gasp
Zamyatin, We
Adolph Hitler, Mein Kampf
The works of the Marquis de Sade, e.g., Juliet, 120 Days of Sodom and Gomorrah,
Justine
Goethe’s Faust
Anton Szandor LaVey, The Satanic Bible, The Satanic Rituals, The Complete Witch,
etc.
The Old Testament, especially the book of Job
Apuleius, The Golden Ass
Juvenal’s Satires
George Orwell, 1984, Animal Farm
Mother Goose (while we now relegate poor old Mother Goose to the nursery, and
consider it fit fare only for children and idiots, originally the rhymes and sayings which it
comprises came into existence as political satires and jingles)
Franz Kafka’s The Trial, The Castle, The Cockroach
MAD Magazine.
Krokodil, the Russian humor magazine
All dystopian fiction

Films:

Horror movies
Documentaries and propaganda films about evil, atrocities, disasters, famines,
epidemics, etc.
All dystopian films.

Saints and exemplars:

 The satirists Lenny Bruce and Mort Sahl.
Physicist Stephen Hawing, whose book A Short History of Time is mentioned above, due
to his contraction at the age of 25 of Lou Gerigh’s disease, which has slowly but relentlessly
completely paralyzed him and will eventually kill of him – in spite of which he has been one
of the greatest movers and shakers of our understanding of physical reality that has ever
lived.
The Roman Emperor Tiberius.
Iosif Vissarionovich Dzugashvili, a.k.a. Joseph Stalin.
Donatien Alphonse François, the Marquis de Sade, soldier, novelist, poet and
thoroughgoing nudzhe-about-Europe. Senator Joseph McCarthy, instigator of the infamous
American “Red Scare” of the 1950s e.v. The late, great Charles Addams, the cartoonist and
master of the macabre (as it happens, his natal Sun was in Aquarius, traditionally ruled by
Saturn). Gary Larson.
Howard Philips Lovecraft (1890-1937), pioneer of American literature of horror: In his
natus, Saturn is in the First House (which rules the body) and rules the cusp of his Sixth
House of Health and Illness, very much in line with his Saturnian body type, temperament
and physiology. From early on in life until his death he exhibited the trait of poikilothermia
or “cold-bloodedness,” a condition involving the body’s inability to maintain an essentially
constant temperature via homeostasis, so that it has a temperature dependent upon and in
proportion to its external conditions, like a fish or lizard, unlike almost all other human
beings who, as mammals, are warm-blooded, their body-temperature normally kept close to a
constant temperature via homeostatic dynamic feedback mechanisms.

American emblems, sigils, symbols, folklore, and urban legend:

Far Eastern cosmological associations:

Trigram from the I Ching:

Earth, the Center. The End of Summer. The Nourishing, the Sweet. Yellow. Controls
the stomach and the spleen. The ox or buffalo. Produces Metal and is produced by Fire,
destroys Water and is destroyed by Wood. Yang: A hill. Yin: a plane, a plain, or a valley.
The Alchemical retort.

Trigram:

K’un, the Receptive, Earth

–- –-
–- –-
–- –-

Hexagram:

2. K’un, the Receptive, Earth

in the King Wen arrangement

–- –-
–- –-
–- –-
–- –-
–- –-
–- –-
 Attributions from Ninpo (Way of the Ninja, Way of Wisdom) and Shinto (Way of the Kami or
Gods): Void, the vast wide sky, out of which anything can come, representing the unconscious mind.

b. Design and Title of Trump

Gringonneur Tarot:

Bembo Tarot:

Swiss Tarot:

Insight Tarot:

Marseille Tarot:

Italian Tarot:

Wirth Tarot:

Waite Tarot:

B.O.T.A. Tarot:

Aquarius Tarot: Like Waite’s version, except that the cross is of a standard design, and is formed of
living wood.

Crowley Tarot:

New Tarot:

America’s Tarot: The Universe (after Crowley). Upright: The famous Earth-from-space poster
taken by the Apollo astronauts. Ghost-over: Loren Eiseley, the great American archeologist and
writer. Reverse: The deadly hell that our world would become after an all-out thermonuclear
war and/or total collapse of Her biosphere due to ecocatastrophe of any other sort.

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot: Moxie sits, cross-legged, with the world in her lap, shrugging her shoulders
over it.

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

R. R. McCammon’s Tarot:

c. Divinatory Meanings
Case:

Christian:

Crowley:
Douglas:

Gray:

Golden Dawn:

Grimaud:

Huson:

Kahn:

Kaplan:

Knight:

Lind:

Mathers:

Mayananda:

Papus:

Sadhu:

Thierens:

Ussher:

Waite:

The Divine Comedy Tarot:

Biblical Tarot: OT: NT:

John Burt’s MAD Tarot:

The Robert A. Heinlein Tarot:

The H. P. Lovecraft Tarot:

The Stephen King Tarot:

The R. R. McCammon Tarot:

General meaning:

d. Interrelationships of the Path and the Trump